Hearts of Darkness
by Legend Maker
Summary: "The conquest of the earth...is not a pretty thing when you look into it too much." The sun sets on all your yesterdays, Titans. No matter what you do, TOMORROW BELONGS TO ME.
1. New Divide

_**Hearts of Darkness**_

Chapter 1: New Divide

"Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past."

-George Orwell, _1984_

_**Life's but a game, on massive boards,**_

_**Some be movers, **_

_**Most are piece**_

_**They say a coward dies a thousand times**_

_**But the valiant more swiftly cease**_

_**Of all the lies told to me**_

_**That death comes for all rises above**_

_**You champion on with all your strength**_

_**While all I see**_

_**Is the lack thereof**_

_**So we stand, at eternal ends,**_

_**For that is where you laid the ground**_

_**There is no height you can rise to reach me**_

_**Before I bring you**_

_**Down.**_

_In war, mistakes are made. Some are worse than others. Some are never realized._

_The mistake Raven made was made to save lives. The villain, the Lord, he'd hurt them. He'd used aspects of her birthright, her friends, her lover, and remade himself as a would-be god. He had unleashed those powers on her city. Thousands were dying._

_She had to stop him, and it would not be easy. The Titans had swiftly assembled aid, but it might not have been enough. Even if it was, waging war in Jump City was unthinkable. The Lord had already hurt it so much. Battling him while still in it could have, would have, left the rest in ruins that King Phyrrus would have lamented._

_Raven's lamentation, later on, was that would not be the first time she would make such an observation. At the time, her course was clear. The Lord was new in his power, power he'd partly taken from her. The door swung both ways._

_Normally, Raven could teleport, at most, a hundred miles. Tapped into the Lord's power, she'd gone far further, drawing him and her allies across the world into the dead zone of the Sahara Desert. They'd made their stand there. They'd scarred the world._

_But they had won. Robin had assessed the Lord's weakness, and the Titans had lasted long enough for it to come to bear. The sun rose, and the Lord was destroyed._

_Maybe a fresh mind would have realized the possibilities, but Raven, and the Titans, were far too battered for such things._

_The door swung both ways._

_Her weariness, and the need to rise above it to keep her wounded friends alive, had ensured that she did not sense it. Sense the last fleeting remains of a dark presence fleeing into her, hiding in her. Until she'd taken the Titans home._

_What the Lord had wrought was the final assurance that let him escape. Raven was too heartbroken by the destruction, too overwhelmed by what her empathy brought to her, to sense him leaving. And so, the Lord survived._

_It would not be the last time the Lord would use his mortal enemies for his own ends._

_Far from it._

* * *

Deep in the heart of Titans Tower, there was a special room.

Few outside of the core team knew of its existence. It was not of 'practical' importance, like safe rooms or escape routes. It was simply a small room of remembrance and trophies, carefully hidden away so it would be harder to damage. Mementos of things lost and won, including photographs.

Adam "Metatron" Matthews popped a jelly baby into his mouth as he perused the pictures. The first of the team, after the battles of Neithercut and the Crimson Queen, and Torment remaking Jump, the group standing in front of Stone Industries as it was rebuilt into what was now known as the T-Tower. One with Savior, after the Final Night. The 'official' photo after Gauntlet had joined, during a visit to the Candide house, with Pangloss in the background looking annoyed his usual TV-watching seat was occupied. One with Scalpel, after the dustup with the White Hole and Dr. Nickelson. Another more recent shot with Ryce taken on her birthday immediately following her unpleasant brother's gruesome and yet satisfying demise. Other photos, including various team shots and one with virtually every superhero in the world after they'd united to stop another universal crisis before it could start. And the latest photo of the team, all ten members (and the help): it currently occupied the center of the main cornucopia of memories.

Metatron wasn't paying attention to that photo, though. Instead, he was perusing another photo of the team off to the side. It also had all ten members, though it was clearly older: Sophie had not yet fully embraced the lifestyle and had appeared in normal clothing, and Raven was also wearing her old, bathing suit style-costume, rather then the full body one she'd switched to in the wake of the machinations of Alexander Luthor. It also wasn't a very good photo: the camera seemed to be at a slight angle, and there was an awkward space between Scalpel and Cyborg that a professional photographer probably would have thrown a fit over. With all the other photos, its flaws were lessened, though it was clear why that one wasn't the centerpiece.

"…heh." Metatron said, a soft smile ghosting across his face. "All of Noel's hours of organization…wasted. I bet he was pissed…"

The shuddering vibration rattled through the entire room. Metatron felt the oscillation run up through his calves, and recognized it as a brief, sudden earth tremor.

"So." Metatron said, a less flippant sound emerging from the blond, spectacled girl beside him. Their recent Jump had been a pleasant one, but it was lost by the tense growl that came from her. The demon didn't need to see: He knew she was bristling.

The wire holding the central picture snapped, and Metatron's eyes followed the framed photo down as it hit the floor. The glass over the picture shattered into a spider-web of cracks, obscuring the likenesses of the Titans from view. Metatron stared at the broken glass for a bit, before popping another jelly baby in his mouth.

"Looka me." Metatron said, in an uncharacteristically dry and quiet tone. "I'm the author, and I can do subtle."

Metatron didn't say anything else, as he bent down and picked up the broken picture, carefully removing the photo from the glass and the frame. Having succeeded in not cutting himself, he produced a tack and pinned it to the wall in the rough position it had been, before stepping back and looking at the photo.

"…she could probably use a hand." Metatron said, and walked off, Ryce following in his steps.

* * *

Tara Markov had not gotten the best of all worlds when it came to her body. While she had good looks, great hair, and the ability to make whole cities come tumbling down if she wanted, it was balanced by a flat chest, little in the way of curves, and a metabolism so intense that crossing the hundred pound mark weight had always been a problem for her. She did some workouts, but nothing to the degree of some of her teammates, and hence just had some residual muscle.

None of that mattered at the moment, as she slammed Noel Collins against the wall like he weighed nothing. Considering the fact she was moving 180+ pounds of near dead-weight, it was even more impressive. But adrenaline and rage could do amazing things.

In the wake of Raven's terrible revelation, such things lost any impressive aspect.

"YOU BASTARD!" Tara screamed, her eyes burning such a bright gold that steam seemed to rise from her face. Noel's own eyes were an almost exact reverse: his vision had been clouded over by a shocked despair so great it seemed to add a thousand extra pounds to his body. He barely seemed to register what Terra was doing, vocally or physically, as she screamed a noiseless sound of rage and the whole Tower shook one more time.

"ALL THAT TIME IN THE TRAINING ROOM! TORTURING ME! TELLING ME I WASN'T GOOD ENOUGH! AND YOU FUCKING _**KILL**__** US? **__**YOU?**__** YOU**__** GODDAMN **__**FUCKING**__**…**__**!"**_

"TERRA!" Came a new voice, as Cyborg came up behind Terra and dragged her off her teammate. The fact that he had to struggle to do it was not lost on him. Anger could do amazing things. That was also not lost on him: if he hadn't been half-machine, he suspected he'd be strangling Noel in Tara's place.

"LET ME GO! _**LET**__** ME **__**GO!"**_ Terra shrieked. Without her holding him up, Noel slid down the wall, his eyes still not focusing on anything. _**"HE**__** HAS **__**TO **__**PAY! **__**YOU **__**BASTARD!**__** YOU **__**BASTARDDDDDDDDDDDDD!"**_

"Yes Terra. He's a bastard." Cyborg snarled, shooting Savior a glare so cold and intense Beast Boy almost swore he saw frost materialized on Noel's eyebrows. "But you're forgetting the parts Raven told us before she revealed this. The parts about the Lord."

"_**I**__** DON'T **__**CARE! **__**HE **__**HAS**__** TO **__**PAY! **__**I'LL **__**BURY **__**HIM**__** ALIVE! **__**HE**__** DID **__**IT **__**TO **__**ME! **__**TO **__**GAR! **__**TO**__**…**__**!"**_

"Terra, you check your shit right now, or I'll tranq you." Cyborg said, the tip of his index finger popping open as a needle emerged. Terra stared in shock at the sight. "You have every right to be angry. We're all angry. But we can't fragment. NOT. NOW. We have to RISE ABOVE IT."

Cyborg let Terra go, and amazingly she didn't immediately leap back onto Noel's throat. Looking like it took every bit of willpower she had, Terra stalked back over to Beast Boy's side. Her boyfriend had not moved since Raven had told them what happened that fateful Halloween. From the look on his face, he appeared to have briefly lost the concept of what moving was all about. After giving the still nearly-catatonic Noel another fearsome glare, Cyborg also stepped back.

"…Raven…"

Raven, lost in the state of numbness she'd forced herself into, had not noticed Starfire approaching. She'd had to put herself into such a state. The outburst of emotion that would have, and had, accompanied her terrible news would have destroyed her otherwise. And it still hadn't been enough. She felt like she was covered in raw, gaping wounds, the wounds that now existed on her teammate's hearts and souls.

"Raven…please tell me this isn't true."

Raven stared dully back at Starfire, as tears bubbled in her green eyes.

"Tell me it's a lie. Some sort of loyalty test. Some immensely cruel form of humor I do not understand. Please tell me this didn't happen. Please…tell me…"

Raven looked at her teammate, and the fact that she said nothing said it all. Starfire gave one brief sniffle, and turned into Robin's arms, her shoulders shaking as she silently wept. The fact that Robin was directing his burning, terrible glare at HER was something Raven had suspected might happen. She did not blame him in the slightest.

"…well." Sophie said quietly, sitting on the couch next to Nigel, who looked even more confused than Beast Boy did. "I had wondered why I was having sharp, stabbing pains in my back whenever I walked past him."

"Dude…dudette…Sophie, not now. Not…ever." Beast Boy said, looking like he had to swallow back vomit. "God, I need a drink."

"I vote that next Halloween we borrow a time machine and skip to November 1st." Gauntlet said. "Next time we see that ubermensch wannabe, HE ISN'T WALKING AWAY. He just knocked Hitler out of first place in my 'people I'm willing to kill.' list."

"…I'm not certain…what?" Nigel said, cocking his head as if he were trying to work out a particularly troublesome math equation. "He killed us? Noel? We're still alive, I know how a dead body operates, this is not…how could he manage…even if we consider…do we put him on trial for treason or…" Nigel said, his rambling trailing off as Sophie put a hand on his shoulder.

"Please. No complicated shit. I want to hit something. Anything. Anyone. Legion of Doom. Brotherhood of Evil. Secret Six. I'll take The Pirates That Don't Do Anything, ANYTHING." Gauntlet said, before Cyborg stood up and walked over to Noel. Noel had barely moved, his own motion since he'd fallen was to place his hands over his face. Cyborg observed him for several silent moments.

"…he didn't know either." Cyborg said, turning back towards Raven. "You kept it a secret from everyone. Even him."

"…yes." Raven said. "Only I hid it. It was solely my choice. I…needed to know certain things. It took me a long time to learn."

"Well, let's speed up the next step then, shall we?" Cyborg said, as he engaged his sonic cannon and whirled around to aim it at Noel's face. The low, throbbing hum of the weapon was enough to make Noel snap his face up, staring into the glowing weapon.

"HEY!" Terra yelled.

"Cyborg…!" Robin said, turning away from Starfire as much as he could while still holding her close, one hand going to his belt. "I KNOW you're more rational than that. You were ACTING that way not a minute ago."

"You're right Robin. Every single rational bit of me is processing the information I was just given, and requesting more input so I can make a proper, cognizant judgment about this incident." Cyborg said. "And every single other bit of me, then and now, is SCREAMING to WASTE THIS RATFUCK SON OF A BITCH RIGHT NOW! GUESS WHICH SIDE'S WINNING NOW?"

"Victor…" Starfire breathed. "…it is not you."

The quiet in the room was suffocating.

"…you're right Star." Cyborg said, lifting his weapon arm. "It's not. I'm not that WEAK."

A loud whistle caused the entire room to start, and every set of eyes turned to look at Metatron, who was leaning against the nearest hallway entrance, his attention, despite being the whistler, not on them, but on some papers he was skimming through. Beside him, their maid was staring into the room, and for all her five-nothing pocket-sizeness, there was something peculiar about how she stood. Raven tensed inwardly…the slanted pupils told her all she needed to know about the imminent reaction, and it was exactly what they did NOT need right now.

Unfortunately, by the time the sorceress realized this, Ryce was already talking.

"Done then? No? Well…y'goin' to have to hit the pause button anyway, 'cause we can't have you holdin' your breaths in tantrum-y emotional bullshit, y'might get a rash."

"Ryce," Raven tried to forestall, but the blonde didn't hear her.

"_**You**_ be quiet, 'cause you KNEW this would happen if y'waited," Ryce glared her tone nothing short of venomous before turning back to her family. "What the HELL is the matter with the lot of you? How many years of havin' your back does the damn jackwagon need to put in b'fore y'recognize that in spite of his less than congenial nature that he'd do ANYTHIN' for ANYONE here? Y'throw that all away cause he's not indestructible? Lemme open the floor for anyone of you t' get up off'a y'arses and claim y'have it in you to toss aside the Lord or his influence. Well? C'mon then! Up you get! Which one of you's been holdin' out on us all since everyone's quick to fault him on what m'sure y're all SO prepared for?" Ryce glared at them, taking the brief moment of silence as a lengthy answer, "No one? Well fancy that! M'sorry…M'not gonna stand here and let y'play into that twisted man-child's hands cause tha's EXACTLY what you're doin' with this knee-jerk fit! Turn 'gainst each other and Ricky doesn't even **need** to mindfuck the lot of you to do it like he did Noel. Y'wanna be angry? **BE**** ANGRY**! But be angry at the right thing! Don' b'too bloody stupid to see y'bein' manipulated too, 'cause SORRY to piss on your chips, boys and girls, but that is **EXACTLY**** WHAT ****IS ****HAPPE**-"

The girl trailed off as the gentle touch fell on her shoulder. Her head snapped to the hand that had silenced her and up to its owner's eyes, who smiled kindly at her, before looking towards the Titans. Lips thinning, Ryce followed the stare towards them.

There was confusion in their eyes, she suddenly realized. Confusion and intrigue—as if she had been speaking in a foreign, strange language they were very interested in learning. At least from the ones that didn't look a second away from strangling her.

Glancing towards Raven, it dawned on the Titan's maid that the half-demon hadn't gotten very far in her explanation.

"Hi there," Metatron's voice cut through her musings as he straightened the papers he was seemingly done reading. "As much as I love your passion, munchkin, and while I _hate_ to interrupt the Blame Game Wangst, now that everyone's done throwing up a little and had their respective feelings towards committing hematic homicide—oh, how I love alliteration—brought out into the open, there're some details Raven was going to get around that I think I'll just jump ahead to." Metatron said, picking out a paper at random from the stack. "Like this signed testimony from Dr. Sid, you remember him right, the guy who fixed Noel last time he broke? He also wanted to do a 'case' on me? Oh wait, you wouldn't know that, would you. Anywho, it says some obvious, scientifically-proven, nonsense about brain damage in regards to neurotoxins not being so pin-point specific in targeting the part of the brain that controls morality, and that anything that would have had to nuke Noel's mind to the point where he thought killing you all in cold blood was the only solution would have also burned through the parts of the brain that controlled fine movement, vision, and… libido?" Metatron did a double-take. "Really? That might have actually been fun to watch. But for once this isn't about my fun. It's about what this means: That if things had gone according to just being injected with poison, Noel should have been a thrashing, blind, impotent cripple instead of some sort of super-predator. Unless—and there's a smidgen of a chance that this _just _might be relevant to the discussion—there was an outside force manipulating the events and taking advantage of his eroding brain so that it could _precisely __manufacture__ things_ to engineer him into the sort of person needed to make with the attempting and succeeding in killing you all. Now, I may not have passed high school—though I got that free doctorate from that place I saved from being eaten by sentient fungus—but it sounds an awful lot like Noel was just a puppet, a pawn, a pasty, a Manchurian candidate—and there goes the alliterative streak again—to the REAL evil force who got you all dead. That being, shockingly, someone with a history of wanting to kill you: THE LORD. Are we under-comprehending the lexemes coming out of my noise hole? Oh, and as a final note, I'd like to thank whichever one of you got me an electronic thesaurus last Christmas. Dead useful, that thing. …Could've probably worded that better."

For a second, only Ryce's dryly amused snort broke the silence.

"…thirsty work, alliteration." Morgue said, handing Metatron a glass of water.

"It's all worth it to see those precious smiles on your faces." Metatron winked, nodding towards the rigid Titans as he drank. The only one that was still moving was Gauntlet, who was muttering in an angry, inarticulate drone.

Beast Boy was about to say something to break the silence when he suddenly felt Terra stiffen. At first he thought Noel had gotten up, but a quick glance showed he was still sitting on the floor. Turning his eyes back towards Terra, Beast Boy saw a rare sight: wheels turning in Terra's brain as she managed to work something out before any of the other Titans. Though, as Beast Boy in retrospect mused, it was very likely Robin had worked it out first and had either said nothing or been beaten to the punch.

"…you told _them_." Terra said, standing up as she glared at Raven. _**"A**__** SECRET **__**LIKE**__** THIS **__**AND**__** YOU **__**TOLD **__**THEM**__**! **__**THE **__**ASTHMATIC **__**HIRED **__**HELP **__**FROM**__** THE **__**LOVECRAFTIAN**__** BEYOND **__**AND**__** THE **__**FUCKING **__**CLOWN **__**WHO**__** JUMPS **__**IN **__**AND**__** OUT **__**OF **__**OUR**__** LIVES **__**LIKE**__** SOME**__** SORT **__**OF**__** FUCKING **__**DEMENTED**__** POGOSTICKER!"**_

"Is that a word? Can I use it? Sounds like something that'd come up often in my conversations." Metatron asked calmly, studying Terra as Ryce, in an equally calm voice, vulgarly suggested which orifice Terra could jam a pogostick into.

"I…" Raven tried…again, to no avail.

"THEM? YOU DON'T TELL ROBIN, OR STARFIRE, OR, HELL, FUCKING NEVERBREAKASECRET MAN, YOU TELL THEM! WHAT THE FUCK IS _**WRONG**_ WITH YOU? WHO THE FUCK DO YOU THINK YOU ARE!" Terra screamed as her eyes flushed gold again, distinctly ignoring the male half-demon's ramblings.

"Terra…"

"_**SO**__** MANY **__**DAMN**__** ALTERNATE **__**DIMENSIONS **__**WHERE**__** I'M **__**A **__**TRAITOR, **__**A **__**MONSTER!"**_ Terra roared, as the Tower began to shake again. _**"I **__**HAD **__**TO **__**TAKE **__**IT **__**ALL **__**AND **__**BE**__** SPOON**__** FED**__** SHIT **__**THAT **__**I**__** HAD **__**TO **__**BE **__**BETTER!**__** I **__**HAD **__**TO **__**RISE **__**ABOVE **__**IT! **__**LIKE **__**THE **__**DEMON**__** CHILD, **__**LIKE **__**THE **__**FUCKING **__**WANNABE **__**BATMAN **__**WHO **__**THOUGHT **__**HE **__**HAD **__**ANY **__**RIGHT **__**TO **__**TELL **__**ME **__**JACK**__**SHIT! **__**AND**__** OH **__**LOOK, **__**THE **__**REAL **__**TRAITORS **__**END **__**UP**__** BEING **__**THE **__**ONES**__** WHO **__**THOUGHT **__**THEY**__** WERE**__** SO **__**DAMN **__**GREAT **__**OVERCOMING**__** THE **__**SHIT **__**THEY **__**NEVER **__**OVERCAME **__**WHEN **__**IT **__**CAME **__**DOWN **__**TO **__**IT! **__**WHEN **__**WE'RE **__**DONE **__**HANGING **__**HIM, **__**WE **__**SHOULD **__**PUT**__** ANOTHER **__**NOOSE **__**RIGHT **__**UP **__**NEXT **__**TO**__**…**__**!"**_

Terra's rant died in her throat as Starfire's hand lightly but firmly took Terra's shoulder.

"Friend Terra, your anger is, as Victor said, fully justified." Starfire said, looking deeply into Terra's eyes. "But you are skirting near the trap of many humans, which is attempting to connect your own pain to an issue where it really has no involvement. You have been wronged, we all have. That cannot be forgotten, perhaps not even forgiven. But there are greater issues at stake here then your grief, then any of our grief. The Lord is planning something. We were told this before Raven revealed her secret. She revealed it so the Lord could not use it against us, as much as it would hurt us, and her. So I ask you to remember this, and to direct your anger at the proper target. When this is done…then we shall see what truly remains."

Starfire turned away from Terra, looking at Raven again, her eyes now dry.

"Raven, is it true? Did you confide in Adam and Alaryce, perhaps because you felt you could not confide in us?"

"Nah. I just figured it out myself." Metatron said, now sitting on a nearby table. "Remember? I came in during Christmas, when you were all running around due to the big party, and Noel and Raven were in a rut none of you knew the reasons behind? Yeah, that was when. So I thought hey, can't repeat this plot device TOO many times, and I did the only natural thing: Completely violated Raven's privacy and jumped into her mirror, and got flashes of what happened. I also detected something of Ricky on them—he leaves a taint—and that was enough, after I looked at last Halloween's report. Raven was nice enough not to mind-wipe me for it. Then again, maybe it was out of consideration for how damn expensive evil sentient satellites are."

"And why didn't you tell us?" Robin asked, deciding that discussing the definition of 'only natural thing' could wait.

"Yes. Why? What could have possibly driven me to maintain silence when most of the truth was still unknown? Because, really, once Raven had finally put the puzzle together and came to you with all the facts, you all took it perfectly well and let her explain everything before trying to strangle Noel, right? One must wonder what my thought process could have been." Metatron replied easily, popping another Jelly Baby in his mouth. "It's simple really: No presents make Met sad." He offered him a grin. "Or if you want me to offer it in even simpler terms, would you have believed a word I said?"

"Probably; you're a bit like a mad sage in that regard. What you say may sound like gibberish at times, but there's wisdom in there somewhere." Sophie said, running a hand through her hair as her own mind started to click over the various tidbits that lay before her.

Sighing in frustration, Tim turned to his quietly-seething maid, who had settled stiffly into a chair, "And you? What are your reasons?"

"Wasn't my place to say, Tim. I saw that when I calmed m'self down and I think you do to. If there was any hope of this goin' as bloodlessly as possible, it had to come from her. I almost DID say something but…" she paused shifting a bit in her chair at the memory, "Bit of an understatement, but had quite a lot on my mind at the moment I found out. 'Fortunately,' it distracted me enough to stay mum 'til I was able to not charge in like a damn eejit, and tear ev'rythin' Raven was tryin' to figure out apart."

"And what the hell was so important that you, for once, kept your big mouth shut? Met have a hangnail?" Terra snarled.

Ryce's jaw gritted tightly, the sound of her grinding teeth not lost on those few with exceptional hearing. Her eyes darted up to narrow in on Terra, "No. As self-absorbed as even YOU are, Markov…M'sure you recall my seizin' on the livin' room floor, attemptin' to rip my own eyes out a few months ago."

Terra's enraged mind tore into the softball Ryce had just lobbed at her with cutting and vicious ease, "Yea…I'm sure _**you**_ recall getting up and attacking both of these assholes when you were done."

The tension in Ryce's jaw ripped out across the rest of her body as her hypocrisy was thrown back in her face. It was a satisfying sight for the other blond and a satisfying sound to hear the quiet stiffness in her tone when she said softly "…And that was wrong."

Ryce fell uncharacteristically silent after that, looking only at the floor, ceiling, and whoever else was NOT looking at her in the moment. Terra might have said something in that regard, but was stopped by the chilly cold feeling that passed by her, causing goosebumps along her flesh, and a shudder as she turned towards her boyfriend, seeking comfort. The situation was such that it could even pierce her boiling anger.

"I'm still torn with what to do, or say," Scalpel muttered, attempting to fill in the sudden silence. "Every response, every passion, is trying to get me to do things I'll regret. But I'm still sitting here, and as I said earlier, we aren't bodies yet. Whatever happened to Noel…"

Scalpel turned towards the still-sitting Titan, who blinked for possibly the first time in the last ten minutes.

"You may have said or done things I disagree with, but I have never doubted your word up until now. What are your thoughts on this?"

Noel stared dully, opening his mouth a touch after several seconds, and then closing it again.

"Sorry Nigel, he's a bit too busy being crushed under undeserved weight of killing the only family he ever had and rapidly connecting that to all the angst and pity pots he has about becoming his father and really being a monster and blah blah blah, you'd better not backslide into being an asshole." Metatron said, walking over to the non-responsive Titan and sliding down to sit next to him. He sighed, searching for something in Noel's expression. "You'll have better luck getting one of his trademark annoying speeches later."

"Then where do we go from here?" Scalpel said.

"I think…we need a break. Let this sink in a bit more." Robin said. "When everyone's ready, we'll gather again and Raven can reiterate what's needed, fill in the rest of the details. But it sounds like we're on a timeline, so we'd best not take TOO long…well, take all the time you need but…yeah." Robin said, sitting down and taking off his mask. It was one of the rare times when Robin seemed overwhelmed, and though it passed swiftly, that fact was registered by every Titan, as they drifted off in their twos and threes. For his part, Met spared Noel a brief pat on the head before jumping to his feet and leaving with Beast Boy and Terra.

"I'm sorry, I just HAVE to ask. Is there REALLY a Neverbreakasecret Man? And if so, what's his backstory? Did it involve the Degrassi cast?"

Terra looked like she wanted to punch Met, but Noel didn't notice. He was back to staring, half-focused, at the floor: he had been doing that for some time when the shadow fell over him. He looked up at Starfire, whose face was unreadable.

"If this was a simple case, I would have executed you myself. Betrayal is one of the greatest crimes my species knows." Starfire said quietly. "But this is not a simple case. And as you know, to my species, the greatest crime is not being a traitor, but forcing someone to become a traitor. For what you have done, I loathe you. For why it happened, I let go of my loathing. I forgive you."

Noel blinked again.

"But I know your weaknesses, Noel. I know how prone you are to certain self-indulgences. I know that you have your own unique weight to bear. But I have seen you battle through hundreds of situations, and I know you are not weak except when it appeals to you. I have accepted all the times you have given in to your toxic self-absorption. I will not accept it this time. Learn, and agonize, over what you are entitled to in this situation, and nothing more. Or my love and respect for you will die. And there is nothing in this, or any world, that can bring that back, Noel Collins. And that is all I have to say."

Starfire left without another sound. A few seconds later Ryce finally slid out of her own chair and slinked from the room. She paused once in the doorway to turn back and glance at him, looking torn between wanting to hit something and wanting to offer up some word of comfort to him. She chose neither in the end. Either way, it left Noel alone save for a million thoughts.

What was worst for Noel was that he had no idea which ones were truly his.

* * *

Raven looked at the distant Jump City, its lights shining out the window as she felt Robin approach.

"You should know why I'm here."

"I do." Raven said, continuing to look out the window. "You're not angry at Noel. You're angry at me."

"How could you keep this a secret, Raven?" Robin said. "From what I gathered, you'd worked out all the details by last Christmas. Even considering the Darkseid issue, and what you learned last Halloween…why did you wait until now? Why didn't…"

"I trust you? I do, Robin. With something like this? You know why, Tim." Raven said, turning to look at Robin with these words. "Because your late mentor was insane."

"….this is news to me. And I hardly see how it's relevant." Robin said, crossing his arms.

"It was a personal observation that I never felt needed to be shared."

"It's not correct…"

"It is, Tim. Batman was insane. It was a very beneficial and benevolent insanity, but that is what it was. He watched his parents die in front of him, and his solution was to travel all over the world, learning every single style of combat and criminal science and other things, and then to return home and decide the most effective way to scare criminals was to dress up as a giant bat. Every time I was with him, I could feel it: the kindness, the heroism, the devotion, the love for you and your fellows…and beneath it all a high, keening scream that never stopped. Not once." Raven said. "The reason you're Robin is because you saw the insanity threaten to overwhelm the benevolence that guided it and interfered. You became a hero out of true altruism. But the man who taught you became one because he lost his mind. In the shadow of his brilliance, his legacy…and his flaws…I did what I thought was best. Just like when you threw Nigel off the team for something that wasn't his fault. Or what you did to Viridian. Something like this, I didn't know if I would get Tim Drake…or the Son of the Bat. It was something I wasn't willing to chance, until there wasn't any other way. That's why I didn't tell you. And why I tell you what I thought about certain things now."

"…maybe I'm the product of his madness, but I'm not the only one who's been changed by the insanity of someone else. You sound _just _like Batman, at his worst. And the Lord." Robin said.

Raven said nothing. Robin held his own gaze…

The tear that slid down Raven's cheek was crystal clear.

"…I…didn't know what to do…" Raven said. "Knowing the full story…it just didn't seem to help…I meditated on it for days at a time, spoke with higher intelligences, tried to replicate all the possible ramifications to really know if I should…watching Noel act so confused over why I was acting this way, knowing I still loved him, knowing what his love for me helped do…and finding out what the Lord planned, realizing that I had to tell you to keep him from doing it…knowing what could happen…I tried, Tim. I don't know what else I could have tried…we've gone through so much and…and…"

"You're crying." Robin said quietly. Raven blinked, before touching her hand to her face. "I remember when we first met up. The stoic ice queen from another dimension. I remember how you kept the truth from us about Trigon's coming. And why. You felt like you belonged here, and you didn't want to be rejected. And…part of it was just how you were taught. Raised in Azarath to never feel anything, to ward off your father. That…really played a role, as much as anything else, to why you made your decisions. But we stood by you, and gave you a chance to do something more. To be something more than what so many expected you to be. Even if it was just to make it up to us."

Robin reached up, removing his mask again. He held it in his hand, looking at it instead of Raven.

"It's been years since then. So much has happened, so much has changed…but some things never change. You were wrong for what you did. So was I. We're both only human…"

Robin sighed again, before he briefly made a fist around the mask, as if he was trying to punish it for all the pain and misfortune it had made him part of.

The fact that when he stopped trying to crush it that it immediately sprang back into its normal shape said it all to him.

"I don't agree, or like, what you did. But I won't let that rule me. If I did, I'd be like the Lord too. And neither of us is the Lord. We're who is going to stop him."

"…thank you." Raven said quietly.

"Such gratitude may be premature, Friend Raven." Starfire said, emerging from behind Robin and coming up to her teammate. "But I forgive you too. Just like I forgave Noel. That is all I can offer you, this time. The rest is up to you. And them."

Starfire turned away from Raven, floating back to Robin and taking his hand. The two walked off without a word. Raven watched them go.

She did not turn to look at Noel for some time, though she'd been aware of him the moment he'd arrived, which was seconds after Robin and Starfire had left, to be specific. Raven had to fight to keep her cold state intact as she turned around. Both for her sake, and his. She did not want to know anything about how Noel felt, beyond what she could read on his face. Going further would help no one.

His expression was loud and clear, and once again Raven had to resist letting her barrier down. She couldn't let herself feel his pain. It would twist any decision she made, and the decisions she would have to make would be hard enough with her emotions already.

"…I'm sorry." Noel said, his voice barely above a whisper.

"…I know." Raven replied.

"…how do you feel?"

Raven looked out the window again. It really was a nice view. What a waste.

"…I don't know." Raven said, turning back to Noel. "I…really don't."

"…okay." Noel said, and walked past her. He didn't say anything else. Raven turned and watched him go.

Left alone, she turned back to the window, seeing her faint reflection in it. Reaching up, she touched her face again, feeling where the tear had gone. Lowering her hand, she looked down at her palm, at what may have remained of its presence.

Closing her fist, Raven leaned her head down into it.

A moment later, the whole rack of windows in front of her shattered.

Raven looked up at the destruction several seconds later, her powers and safety glass having protected her. She blinked once, and then opened her hand.

The greater tasks lay ahead.

* * *

"S'different…s'so bloody different. I had a stroke! Wha's their bleedin' 'scuse? Daft, anorexic tart, fancyin' she went and took the piss out of me with her _**fthagn**__** rl**__**'**__**a**_-" Ryce then gave up on English entirely and slipped into a series of snarling guttural string of nearly pure constantans, sounding like the world's tiniest and most adorable Cthulhu. Angry did not COVER the look in her eyes. If not for the sheer inappropriateness of labeling it as such at this point in time, someone may have referred to it as homicidal.

Ryce had KNOWN this day was coming and coming soon. Her own words echoed back in her head, like a track record: _S__'__not __gonna __be__ pretty __when __he__ finds __out, __Rae__…__ Not __goin__' __to __be__ pretty __for __any__ of __them_. She had _prepared_ herself for it…yet still she had been caught in her own hypocrisy.

"-with a goddamn _PIG!_" Ryce finished in English, actually laboring for breath. The tower was quiet beyond her rage. Very few slept, very few rested, but there was a dead silence, an—ironic—lack of life to the home, a cold sterility to it all.

Ryce stood in the hall with momentarily wide eyes, as if she had just become aware of it. The moment was brief enough to be missed, before she let out another grumble and that flash of discomfort (fear?) was gone. One might almost wonder if her anger was only an excuse to fill the silence.

She skulked along her home, trying to ignore how the angry expression was faltering. She felt her heart shrink and _knew_ she needed to be around people, even if just their presence, so her feet carried her towards the one room someone ALWAYS seemed to be in. The insipid sound of canned laughter, coupled by the dim light of television made her release the breath she didn't realize she had been holding.

She still paused just before the doorway, realizing that she may not exactly be...welcome company for the person in the TV room. Steeling herself, she slipped into the room silently: Even if she didn't want to be alone, it didn't mean she wanted to be yelled at either.

Gauntlet did not notice her entrance, and just stared—glared—dully at the screen.

Ryce's shoulders relaxed: He wasn't Terra, despite the similar hair color. _Something__ they __could _all _celebrate __at __least,_ the clearly-not-at-all-bitter maid thought as she made her way to the sofa…and paused, taking in the stormy look in her friend's eyes. For a few moments she glanced between him and the TV, the dull sounds of _Fraiser_ blathering on in the background. Whatever she saw, it caused her to sit away from Gauntlet, quietly wondering whether or not she should point out that Rob hated this show.

More canned laughter. Ooooooooo's in the air as a couple kiss. Despite being in plain view now, Gauntlet said nothing.

"…m'not gonna ask if you're okay…'cause that's a stupid question…" Ryce said quietly, after minutes of unbearable silence, "so…guess I'll ask if you…well…need anything?" she cringed at how very LAME that sounded. She had not been very prepared, after all.

Rob did not respond, but there was a thinning to his lips. Ryce had to think that this was the unfunniest sitcom ever made, given his quiet response to the jokes. Still, he shook his head—just barely, like he did not trust himself to speak.

"…alright," she looked to the TV, and then back to him, "…why…dun you put on somethin' y'like? You hate this show…"

She could have hit herself for speaking when she had planned to just sit and be quiet. But her nerves were getting the better of her…she had expected less of a reaction from him.

Rob just shrugged. It felt like the movement should have been followed by the creaking of a poorly-oiled machine. "S'fine," his voice came out rough and unused, his own angry rant and swears later maybe tiring him out. "Real, important drama goin' on…like, will Laura lose the zit before the dance? …Thrilling."

Ryce chuckled weakly at the sarcasm, "Aye…life or death issue there."

She immediately looked like she had swallowed her tongue at her choice of wording. In any other situation and at any other time, that look would have been priceless, but now she only cringed and shrunk back into her chair, hoping he managed to miss it.

He had, and Rob gripped the remote tightly while raising the volume, impassive beyond the quiet ember in his eyes that told Ryce enough about how angry he was—enough that she looked down at her hands, gripping her legs close.

"…m'sorry" she said just loud enough to be heard over the increased volume, "Wasn't thinkin'."

"…were you thinking these past 4 months?" Rob snapped quietly, his words clipped and sore. When she turned to him, she found him looking back, eyes hard glints.

Ryce flinched at the stare, eyes widening. She had never heard that curt and angry edge to his voice before. It was almost surreal. It took her a few moments to realize that she had been staring at him, jaw slightly agape, for several long moments.

"M…m'sorry?" she asked.

Rob stared at her for a few more seconds before ripping his gaze back to the TV, his eyes bright and his expression ugly, the very personification of swallowing a bitter pill, "Nothing. Forget it."

"…no," she said, shaking her head and sitting up straighter. She was not stupid and now that the surprise was dulling she knew what this was about. She just never expected goofy blond to be the one on the other end of this conversation, "say what you want to say."

Rob's head snapped to her, his jaw tight, his teeth clenched in anger—he might just say nothing to defy her. But in the end the answer came out in a whispered snarl, "You KNEW," Rob replied, "You never told us. You never told ME."

"…I didn't tell anyone," she agreed quietly, "I couldn't."

An echo slammed into her as she looked at his face and all the anger there. Something different, from sometime and some place different—_"__Far __better __than__ me.__"__** BLAM!**_—Ryce looked away, fighting down the sickness crawling up her throat.

"Why NOT!" Robert demanded, his previous calm completely drowned out by a voice raw and desperate and ANGRY. He didn't even realize that he had stood up. "Raven…Met…and YOU…I could almost understand why they wouldn't say anything, but why NOT YOU? You were supposed to be my friend…" suddenly, his shoulders sagged. He looked pained. "…you're just another liar…"

"I…I didn't lie…" Ryce insisted weakly, forcing herself to look up at him but lacking the strength to get to her own feet, "And I AM your friend…this wasn't my truth to tell, Rob. What would I have even SAID?" her voice cracked involuntarily.

"Anything! 'Hi Rob, did you know you got shot on the head by your housemate? CRAZY TIMES, HUH? HAHAHAHAHAHA!'"

"That's NOT what happened," Ryce snapped, surprising herself by the steel in her voice. "This is _why_ it had to be Raven, I wasn't there—wasn't PART of it. The only reason I know is 'cause my father fuckin' hates me…" she flinched involuntarily at that, "It was Raven's demon to fight. Adam and I were jus' trespassers and we had no right to say anythin'! It…it could never have been ME."

"It could have," Rob said, shaking now, "it could have…but you chose not to let it be… God…you all and your goddamn secrets…would Raven even have TOLD us CRAP if not for the fight? Would I have died thinking my friends would never keep things like my MURDER from me? What ELSE will you decide is not your right to tell, not my right to KNOW? HUH?"

The silence that followed his questions was not unexpected, but it just fueled Gauntlet's frustrations.

"That's what you do isn't it?" Rob growled, "with your magic 8-ball. With your plans with D'xias. With everything," he muttered bitterly, "…I'm tired of it."

"…I…I couldn't" Ryce could only repeat weakly, looking at her feet and finally loss for words. It had been a horrible situation, but she knew that she had made the best choice with it. But for all that she knew, she couldn't get the words out, "Y'right…I…I wanted y'to know… y'should know that…"

"How should I? Who would have told me?" Rob grumbled out. "Certainly not you."

And then he turned to stalk out.

"I…it was the ONLY way for any of this t'NOT play int'his hands!" Ryce pleaded desperately to his retreating back. "SHE had to be the one…I…I…this is what that fucker _**WANTED**__**!**_ D-Dun you _see_ that?" She fought back the sting in her eyes, rubbing them angrily, "what would have happened if it came from me? Ev'ry one would've turned on her…on each other. W-Worse than they are now…everything…it would have fallen apart…"

Rob paused by the door, gripping the frame tightly…but he hadn't left. Ryce took it as a cue to continue. "For Raven an' Noel…this is all they have. Just like it is for me. I have nowhere to go but HERE. You have a family waitin' for you. Ev'ry one else has each other…This is my _**only**_ home and family. I c-couldn't lose that…we _had _to do it the best way possible…please, Robbie…"

She waited. And Rob looked back.

"…I keep telling you…and you don't listen…you never do," he muttered morosely, mostly to himself. His knuckles were white. "…Why didn't you tell _ME?_ You're supposed to be my best friend. If you had just told me…I'd have talked to Raven…I would have kept quiet if you…" he trailed off, shaking his head in a motion that unpleasantly reminded Ryce of resignation. "…I need to go beat up some nice, harmless heavily-armed muggers."

And then he was gone.

And Ryce was alone. The silence was only broken by the laugh track from the TV.

* * *

"You're going out without a TV guide or a Red Bull stuffed into your pocket. This _is_ a first." Cyborg said, leaning against the wall as Gauntlet finished lacing up his shoe.

"I need to go burn off some nervous energy." Gauntlet replied, as his namesake expanded over his arm.

"Right. Nervous energy." Cyborg said. "…Rob. I don't want to say this. Most of me _knows_ I don't have to say this. But after this…I don't know what to think. So I'll say it. Don't do anything stupid."

"Oh yeah, because I'm SO prone to stupid things, aren't I? Stupid things like thinking that we could freaking trust each other! It looks like Noel's being manipulated, but you know what worries me? His nervous system ISN'T normal! For all we know, it WAS all him! I don't even want to THINK about that right now! And the guy who maybe did it is an unkillable self-styled god, and oh look HE WANTS TO BLOW UP THE WORLD AGAIN. So you'll excuse me if I want to just WORK OUT SOME GODDAMN NERVOUS ENERGY AND DEAL WITH IT LATER."

"It's true. His nervous system isn't normal. That's probably why he was the only candidate for what happened. If there was no Noel, the Lord probably would have zagged instead of zigged." Cyborg said, before laughing bitterly. "The curse of having computers in your brain. They keep presenting the situation as 'This happened, Do X' and acting confused when I don't do it. They think something's wrong with the organic parts. Hah. Oh man, our lives."

"When I sell the movie rights, I won't mention this whole mess."

"I sold the movie rights three years ago."

"Not to Gauntlet: The Movie, starring Gauntlet. Stay on my good side or else you'll get played by Kenan Thompson."

"Stay on MY good side or else I'll have you played by…Some…lame dude…nuts." Cyborg said, and sighed. "This sucks, doesn't it? Being the odd two out in the Titans? Everyone else is hooked up. Hell, even Ryce and Met have their weird…'spooning together as friends' thing. Us, Llarness is off with Zatanna finding herself and YOU, hah, we ran out of jokes a while ago."

"The way Noel and Rae have been acting, I don't think we'll be the only single ones for much longer."

"The thing is, I realize now why they were having those difficulties these past years. Raven and her secret. Considering they seemed to have smoothed it out, I…eh, that's not important." Cyborg said. "Don't go too far away. You and I were really the only ones who remembered what Raven told us before she revealed the secret. The Lord did this. He has another plan. We have to stop it."

"It doesn't end, man. I miss the rocket powered apes." Gauntlet said. "But the Lord of the Night…he's like herpes. Except that you can have fun getting herpes. See ya Cy. Don't let Met steal too many of my jokes."

"You mean like how you stole all of Gar's?"

"…hey, if all I have to give up for a cute love interest are my jokes, that isn't too bad a tradeoff."

* * *

"…Gar?"

"Yeah?" Beast Boy said, lying on his bed, his arm wrapped around Terra. The two had been silent for the past several minutes, staring at the ceiling, Terra's head on Beast Boy's chest as she listened to his heartbeat.

"If I left, would you come with me?"

Beast Boy was silent.

"…if you don't want to answer…"

"Yes." Beast Boy said quietly. "If it came to that. Yes. I would."

Silence settled over the room again.

"…I don't want it to come to that."

"I know."

"This is our family."

"I know."

"But…how can I…how can we…?" Terra said, her eyes briefly becoming misty. Her anger and rage had finally burned itself out, leaving only the sick hurt of betrayal. Unlike some Titans, she could not keep the emotions at bay, no matter what the specifics of the truth were.

"…Luke 23:34. There were also two others, criminals, led with Him to be put to Death. And when they had come to the place called Calvary, there they crucified Him, and the criminals, one in the right hand and the other on the left. Then Jesus said, 'Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they do.'"

"…easy for him to say."

"Maybe, but forgiving people probably isn't easy for anyone. Especially a mess like this." Beast Boy said. "If he'd just been a simple traitor, I could just condemn him to the ninth level like anyone else, but…"

"…and there's whatever the Lord has planned."

"Yeah."

"We're going to have to deal with that."

"Yeah."

"…I won't leave. Not yet. But when we're done…I don't know."

"Neither do I."

"There anything in your good book about hard choices?"

"…And let us not be weary in well doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not? Galatians 6:9."

"…have you been reading your Bible obsessively lately? I always knew you had faith, but it's come to the foreground recently."

"Star wanted to know stuff about it. Refreshed my mind." Beast Boy said. "Still doesn't keep me from wanting a drink."

"You hit the floor after two martinis."

"Between that and the deep questions, I think that's preferable."

* * *

"We died." Scalpel said, sitting around his and Sophie's usual haunt, the medical bay. The Titans rarely went down there unless they wanted one of the two, or were injured, but their absence seemed more poignant this time, for very good reasons.

"Yes, supposedly." Sophie said, her arsenal of guns laid out before her as she cleaned them.

"I mean actually died. I'm only vaguely aware of what your species thinks of life and death, and what happens after we die, but I'm sure you're not meant to do what we did."

"I'm sorry, Nigel, I'm just not that worried about it. You know me and death: it just is, though I'll admit I never thought I'd be alive to talk about it."

"…she did suggest that was what had happened. Her first report about the Halloween incident." Scalpel said. "We died, and hence we didn't remember. But I always just sort of…dismissed that. Thought it was just those chaotic energies screwing with our minds. I just saw death as not so…well, banal."

"Banal?"

"Well…I'm still here. I was killed, and yet I'm still here. How many of my species has gotten to do the same thing? Even Styles had cloning to explain her return. I got to be pulled back to the original and only body I likely get. Why ME?"

"Well, being friends with a powerful sorceress probably helps. You know, the people who practice magic, who take all the natural laws of the universe and twist them around until they cry uncle? And if you don't buy that, well, perhaps the good karma of repeatedly saving countless lives, countries, civilizations, worlds, existence itself occasionally hands out a perk. Who knows?" Sophie said. "Nigel, your kind survive injuries that should kill ANY human. Your highest elite warrior got shot through the head and came back, clone or not. We spent last Halloween fighting important people in our lives who were DEAD. Death around us has NEVER been normal, or by the standards we were taught when we grew up. The only shocking thing about all this is that Noel did it. And he really didn't. It was the Lord. You know, who's tried to kill us before. Repeatedly. A Lot."

"…I'm just glad you came back. The world wouldn't really have benefited from your death." Nigel said.

"I fear there are other kinds of death possible then what we came back from, Nigel." Sophie said. "We can try and focus on our current big issue, but it might be the equivalent of putting the barn fire out after all the animals have died."

"What?"

"Noel did this to us, Nigel. One of our teammates." Sophie said. "He wasn't himself, and an outside force was arranging everything…but facts have a bad habit of finishing behind feelings. That's why Germany took the brunt of the blame for the first World War when it wasn't even involved in its birth. That's why sometimes you still find black people hanging from a tree in the 21st century. That's why most of the internet chatter devoted to us seems to be all about criticism, and often unhelpful, misinformed criticism, at that. I can think with my head, I am doing so…and yet part of me still wants to give in to violence and do all manner of unpleasant things. Maybe we're alive…but I wonder if the team can survive this. If we're just like the dinosaurs, dead and unaware of that fact. If this is just the last hurrah of a declining empire. If this is, to turn a phrase you know, the straw that will break the camel's back."

"Then let's hope that it isn't." Scalpel said, admiring a wicked-looking version of his namesake. "If not, well…I am a doctor. Perhaps I can invent a back transplant."

* * *

The water crashed among the rocky shores as Noel stood above them, watching the white foam twist and dance. He wondered if it was an exceptionally cold night, or if it was just him.

He'd been turning the small box over in his hand for what seemed like forever, though it was probably only a few minutes. He couldn't really tell if he was thinking or just sunk in an emotional quagmire. The water and the silence offered no answers.

Noel looked down at the box one more time, and then tossed it as far into the distance as he could. He didn't see it drop.

He didn't really want to.

* * *

The living room had grown dark save for the soft glow of the screen. The volume had long since been set to a near mute, allowing the silent pictures to flicker about in their unintentional glowing. If not for the slight glimmer of tired blue eyes peaking out from a pile of blankets on the couch, one would think the television was just left on by someone who had walked away.

A weight settled on the back of a couch, and Ryce felt herself being watched. Shifting, the blankets gave way to her face. The light of the television caused a glint on her glasses that hid the raw red color of her eyes.

"There are leftovers in the fridge," she muttered tiredly not turning to look at the person.

A soft sigh, a rush of wind, and then the weight settled gently beside her, swift and soundless. Ryce continued balancing her chin on her folded arms. Continued watching the doorway, and ignoring everything else.

"How long have you been here?" he asked. His voice was easy to recognize for its calmness.

"…Not long," she lied, disturbing her glasses to rub away hours of strain from her eyes, though the cool metal felt good against the reddened skin. There was a small, bitter laugh when she shook her head, "You're the first person that's come in here that's talked to me."

"Makes sense. They're all lost in their worlds," Metatron noted. "Apparently it's a soul-searching concept, dying," he smiled, a little mystified. "Too busy thinking of death to do much living."

"…They're also pissed the hell off at me," Ryce said quietly.

"Hm. They including Rob?" he asked nonchalantly.

She cringed a bit at the name and nodded, "Aye…him 'specially."

"Perhaps a tad," Metatron tilted his head, as if acknowledging a point in a fencing match, "but don't be egotistical, munchkin, it's not what's on the forefront on their minds, nor will it ever be before their anger dies down."

"Not bein' egotistical…never said I was," she said, her voice gaining an edge.

Her friend smiled, gently touching her arm, "No…but you're letting their silence be about you. It's not," he promised gently. "You're wallowing again," he added, reaching for her hand.

Ryce ripped away and turned to him, not bothering to hide the signs she had spent a few hours crying, "No, m'not, alright? You ever consider that this has NOTHIN' to do with their silence?"

"Yes," he cut her off simply. "But after Rob, you are probably thinking 'if he's like this…what about the rest?'—In fact, there's no way you're not thinking that," he quirked a smile at her. "It's easier to start with the smaller worries, the ones that can be dissuaded quickly. And then I can get on to the bigger ones. It's a system, see?"

"…I didn't tell anyone." she whispered looking back to the door, "Not even you. M'not thinkin any of that cause s'not goin' to matter, is it? 'Cause I didn't say a word…so when the chips fall, m'no better than Raven was. S'all fallin' apart," she curled up tighter on the couch. "Nothin' I said or did would have changed that, Adam…yet, I didn't tell ANYONE. Says a lot about me," she gave another of those soft bitter laughs and shook her head settling back into silent watching.

"Probably not what you think," Metatron replied, unbothered by the laughter. "I didn't tell anyone either and…that's the important thing: I know why I didn't. We all do. Why didn't _you_?"

"…You know too: I promised Raven I wouldn't," her voice was weighted by regret, "Because this…thing…was a family," she wiped her eyes roughly, "And…I…I didn't want it to end…it was _**mine**_ and I didn't want it to end."

Strong arms had wrapped around her before she finished speaking. "Nothing you could have said would have changed anything," he whispered her words back to her once her weight had settled against him. "So you didn't say anything. You trusted Raven to do the best thing she could. By not talking, the response was less explosive than it could have ever been. By letting Raven approach them, you let her be their liberator of truth, rather than their deceiver. For any chance for the family to survive…that needed to happen. You did the best thing."

"…s'not goin' to survive. Least then I'd have walked away without some of them hatin' me," she did not pull away from Metatron's touch, nor did she return it.

"And you, expert in family dynamics," Met said, with no trace of taunting, "know that for a fact."

Ryce didn't reply. Her mouth opened up a few times to try, but in the end all she managed was a cracked, garbled sound before dropping her head into her arms and beginning to weep in a way that she only could in front of Adam.

Her best friend breathed softly and evenly, pulling her to his lap, holding her close. He rubbed her back, warmth spreading familiarly over her body.

"…Ryce," he finally whispered gently, after a brief eternity, allowing her face to nestle against the crook of his neck.

At first, she didn't seem to hear him, instead trying to pull away from the embrace: She could not see the door from her position, she might miss her chance at an apology. But Adam was adamant, and, eventually, she gave up and leaned into him, tears moistening his skin.

"This family is not normal," he said, and there was mirth in his voice. "It will not break because of a mirror trick. Right now people are angry…and letting that get to them. It'll pass. They're big kids. They can see what you saw, with time. And it's all they need to fight. 'Sides, knowing how these things go, something will happen at just the right possible moment to get them to realize that they still love each other after all and all they need to win is each other, huzzah."

The soft snort that came from the blond at that made Metatron smile and he continued in a much softer voice, "I can't guarantee this…but I think they'll be ok. All of them. You too. And once they are, they'll understand—You, Raven and Noel. They'll understand you…because with time, it'll all pass."

Ryce listened silently, her head resting on his shoulder. She wanted so badly to believe him as she always believed him, perhaps to a foolish extent. It had never been this hard.

"…if…if s'not. If s'not goin'ta pass…p-promise me you won't leave…" she whispered, "I…I dun want to be alone again…"

The boy tilted his head, and then shifted a bit to look at her. There was incredulity there, when he asked, "…do you really think I'd walk away from you?"

She looked up at him with shame in her eyes. Self-loathing and doubt that had been carved into her soul and flesh for far too long. Perhaps too long to EVER fully leave, "…I didn't tell you."

"And I thought we agreed you didn't because it was the best thing you could have done," Metatron told her gently, his hand caressing her cheek. "It was a bad situation. Raven did her best. _**You**_ did the best. I'm happy you did," he smiled.

"The best sucks," Ryce hiccupped rawly, forgoing all eloquence.

He chuckled, "Sometimes. But it usually sucks less than anything else. That's why it's the best," he explained with a playful nip at her nose. "…You're mine," Metatron said simply, "My munchkin. You'll never be alone," And then he glanced away, quickly to a nearby clock. "But you do need sleep."

"No," she answered immediately pulling away from him a bit to go back to her spot, "I need to wait…apologize…"

"No. He needs time. He needs to come to you," he instructed her gently, lifting her up, "You need to let him. And to rest."

"…jus' a lil longer," she squirmed back to her spot on the couch resting her head on her hands.

"It won't change that you need to stop waiting," Metatron pointed out.

"Hn," she mumbled, eyes drooping even as she defied his logic, "Jus' gonna say sorry…then-" she yawned widely, "then sleep…"

He chuckled, and he nuzzled her gently. "Trust me?"

"Sorry…then sleep" Ryce repeated with a bit of a whine.

The Morning Child laughed at it, "You're being stubborn."

And then he blink down—because Ryce did not answer. She had fallen asleep completely.

Met considered this for a second and then gathered her back up, turned, and walked towards the door with all too petite girl in his arms.

They all needed rest. A lumpy couch was not the place for it.

* * *

_And as the last vestiges of the fateful day fizzled out, and the sun gradually melted into the ocean horizon giving way to the greater darkness, the Titans did think and ponder with confused and righteous indignation painted by a manipulated betrayal too real for comfort._

_It__ was __because__ of __this __that, __through out __the __Tower, __discussions __flew.__ With __the __revelation__ came __new __conflicts,__ decisions __to __be __made: __Was __this __the__ end? __Could __they __move __past __this? __Could__ they__ forgive __**him**__?__ Look __past __their __emotions, __and __to__ the__ facts? __Could __they __continue __with __the __lives __they __lead__ after __what __happened?_

_When all was said and done, could they abandon their home?_

_So many choices._

_And as the Titans sought rest, though none said it, they all knew—the very last possibility._

_That in five weeks, four days, three hours and twenty-seven seconds, the choice could be made for them._

_The thought, unnerving as it was, was quickly squashed, and the battered young souls forced their problems away, clinging to the sweet reprieve of sleep…_

…All …but …one."

"Adam." Starfire said by way of greeting.

"_Metatron smiled his easy smile at the girl hovering behind him, quietly. She obviously had something in her mind that needed discussing, prompting her to search out the young half-demon, and eventually finding him in the roof. Every line in her face spoke of oncoming tension, while her eyes shone with their usual acceptance that the boy had always found charming, and as she drew herself straight, Metatron knew this was a matter of great imp_—Is this entertaining you at all? Yes? No? Little bit?" Metatron asked, trailing off his random apparently-impromptu narration in favor of his companion.

Starfire did not respond, her emerald eyes staring deep into Metatron's golden ones as if she were searching for something in them. The two stood on the roof of the T-Tower for a silent beat.

"I was serious before." The chaosling commented, now facing the girl fully. "There _is _something you want to talk about, right? With me. Is it about my narration? People keep saying it's too poetic. But really, there's always fun to be had with poetry. You can throw random words together, and there: you have a poem."

"…I do not question your nobility. That, I can tell." Starfire finally said, clearly not talking about Metatron's random roof soliloquy. "I rarely ask questions as it is. Maybe that is a flaw, I do not think so. But I must ask this. Do you care?"

Metatron did not react to the question in any way that the girl could see. He didn't sober up and deflate like part of her was expecting. If anything, his happy smile widened, just a tad.

She didn't know how that made her feel.

"Of all the things today, this is what's troubling you the most, hm? Besides the obvious front-runner." Metatron mused, considering the troubled girl.

"Noel did what he did for very understandable reasons. He's suffering for it. Raven's reasons are harder to grasp to me, but I have spent long enough among you to be able to do it. She feels her own pain; she's felt it far longer than Noel," Starfire said. "I understand why Garfield and Robert utilize humor, and I do not fault them for that. They have many sides. Ryce is usually too difficult to understand, much like you. But at this moment, where she thinks she does not wear her emotions on her sleeve, I can see she is terrified under her anger. You…never change. No matter what. You knew this was going to happen, and your manner never wavered. Maybe it's lack of interaction, but you never act any differently. At all."

"I could argue with that, like for example, bring up my Elvis phase a few months ago, and my Brooklyn accent before that. Not to mention the French Revolution bit during that one 4th of July…"

"That was a strange one." Starfire found herself saying.

"It could have been _beautiful!_" Metatron argued, before raising a palm, possibly to convince himself not to start up the old argument.

Starfire opened her mouth for a second, and then drew herself back with a sigh. "You are being elusive."

"I am." Metatron nodded in agreement.

"…You were THERE. You died as well. The others may have forgotten that small detail, but I haven't." Starfire said, giving up the ghost of composure and letting her true concerns be known. "Maybe it wasn't Noel who did it, but unless you can prove otherwise, we found YOUR CORPSE. The Lord killed YOU, as well. How do you react? The same as you always do. Am I wrong in thinking something is not right? Do you have anything in your heart at all?"

Starfire let out a tired breath and stared at the subject of her distress, visibly drained.

Metatron's smile hadn't wavered as he stared back and listened. Then he got up and moved towards her in two quick strides, too sudden for her to react properly.

Fat too sudden: Before she could have done anything about it, his land lashed out and slapped her in the forehead.

Half a second later, Metatron ate a point-blank Starbolt. His smoking body was thrown backwards against the edge of the roof. He shook his head and looked up, Starfire's hands and eyes now alight with green.

"You had best give me a very strong reason why I should not remove you from this island in a very impolite manner." Starfire said in a low, dangerous tone.

Metatron pushed himself into a seating position, smiling. "That really hurt."

"I hit you, and you STILL wear the same expression." Starfire said. "Are you mad? Or merely dead inside?"

"Insane? Likely. Dead inside? Wow, no, ma'am. Never. Maybe I can just find happiness in little things, Star." Metatron replied, before considering something. "…ok, except torture. Torture kinda sucks. Yeah."

"So you're mad instead of heartless. This fails to bring me much comfort. And you still hit me without cause." Starfire said, though she lowered her arms. She did not, however, cease the energy charge on her hands.

Metatron's grin widened at her words. "And it hurt, didn't it?"

"Yes. Your point?"

"You DIED, Star." Metatron said, jumping to his feet, and approaching, slowly this time. "A little over one and a half years ago, you died. So did I—again, but that's a different story. And so did every person sleeping and resting easy beneath our feet, outside of a certain obsessively-apologetic maid with a guilt complex the size of Ohio who I had to forcibly remove from the living room couch before! But I suppose that's a whole other issue to be tackled later. The point is, we all died. Yet that slap, it hurt. So does the smoking mark on my chest, incidentally." He beamed, now in front of her. "We can _feel__ it. _We're _alive_."

Starfire stared for several more moments, before the energies finally faded from her hands.

"You speak truth." Starfire said. "And you are, for whatever reason, important in this. Yet how you are...I cannot understand it, Adam. Because of that, I cannot decide how to respond to you. And I fear I have little time to make such a choice."

"Ah, there's your problem. You don't have to understand me. Hell, why are you even trying?" Metatron replied. "That's a road to madness."

Starfire maintained her stare, taking in his words. Her shoulders slumped after doing so fully.

She wondered if Metatron saw something in her actions that prompted what he said next.

"…Star, of all the people I could be saying this to…" He began, something of a melancholy finally on his face. "You're thinking too much." He chuckled, before meeting her eyes. "Just do what you want. What you think is right. Trust your gut. Follow your heart. Use the force. Believe in me, who believes in a complete breakfast."

Starfire blinked at that. "Bu-"

"Ah-ah-ah." Metatron interrupted. "No. Stop the overthinking. Stop the worries, the anxiety, the fear. Stop. All of you; every time I see you, ANY of you, this has ALWAYS been the problem. You all focus on the bad. Always."

The girl remained silent, knowing that Metatron was no longer talking about her issues with him.

"Because yes, you DID die, and yes, Noel 'did' it, in some way, shape or form. And your IMMEDIATE and DOMINATING response is to freak out, point fingers, condemn and wallow! Maybe you have reason to! But here's some relevant piece of info: You are all standing! You're breathing! Thinking, talking, growing; a couple of hours ago you were even contemplating strangling Noel—not the best way to past time but I've heard worse." He reached over and petted Starfire, his grin threatening to split his face. "Against all odds, despite how 'common' it might be for 'your line of work', you were dead, but now you are standing on this roof with the cold air biting into your skin, the warmth of my hand against your head, listening to my mad ramblings and feeling all your dumb worries. And that's WONDERFUL." He moved to cup her cheek, staring earnestly. "…Don't you see that?"

"...I suppose my interaction with you is done then." Starfire said, turning away. "You are incorrect though, Adam. They are not sleeping. I think you got a little carried away with your speech to the air."

Metatron's hand came down how his side and he stepped back. "I tend to. They're fun little things, those speeches." He turned to face the now dark sea. "You know, this is all time you could be spending together with Tim. You both need it."

"We've discussed what we need to. It's why I was up here. I really don't know if I'm getting the answers I want, but..." Starfire said. "I don't know if they can recover, Adam. I...have suffered, but I have always been able to deal with it. You do as well, in your own way. The rest of them do not, as you yourself said. This is too much for them."

"Oh definitely." Metatron answered with a shrug. "It'll be a tough one. But you've been the glue before, haven't you?" He beamed at her. "Koriand'r. Starfire. Heart of the team. I think you'll do nicely."

"Hearts have no use without blood. This is going to bleed. I don't know when, or if, it will stop." Starfire said. "I simply wondered if you cared about the wound."

Starfire's communicator crackled. She answered it.

"We're re-convening, Star. I see you're with Metatron: if he's ready he should come along."

"I suspect he is." Starfire said, signing off. She looked at Adam again. "I do not plan to be another meal for that vampire."

"Pushing the blood metaphor a little too much." He answered with a smile.

"…When you say that is the case, I know it is true."

"Hah. Ricky gets sparkly, like a diamond, when the sun hits him."

"Maybe he does, I tended not to notice with the screaming."

And so they were off.

* * *

"The Lord has another plan in the works, something big. I don't think it even directly involves us. I was able to learn this when we connected during the Black Lantern incident: Cyborg's shot caused a brief 'cross-over' of thoughts. I…do not think the Lord was aware of what I learned. I can only say that with fair confidence though, not absolute. But we have a good chance that he has no knowledge of the fact I know his plan.

"Due to the nature of the information received, I do not know many details. But I know when, and where. February 14th, this February 14th. On an island near Europe. The Lord plans to evoke something world-shaking. Whether he can control it or not…I don't know. But that's his plan."

Raven fell silent, looking at her re-assembled teammates. The time apart clearly hadn't helped much, but they were willing to go forward onto the important issues.

She didn't deserve them.

"Great Raven…but you told us this already." Beast Boy said.

"…because we have to make another choice. In regards to how we are going to counter his plan."

"Simple. We go utterly destroy his ass." Gauntlet said.

"That is the general idea, Gauntlet…but it's the how that matters. I…"

Raven could not speak for a moment.

"I want to go confront him alone. Just this team. No help. No called in favors. No backup. Just us."

It was Terra, expectedly, that broke the silence that followed.

"…ARE YOU CRAZY?"

"This isn't some drug kingpin, Raven. This is a self-styled shadow god. I…you have a reason, I assume." Robin said. Raven sighed deeply. Those used to her tended-to-be overdramatic sighs would have noted the tone of true lachrymose in this one, under different circumstances. Their minds, however, were understandably elsewhere.

"Normally I wouldn't even think of doing it this way. But…" Raven said. "There's a chance he doesn't know, a good chance to take him completely by surprise. If we can do that…we might be able to destroy him. Once and for all."

"How does this have anything to do with not getting the militia ready?" Gauntlet said.

"We do have ways of subtly gathering help. A text to Herald and we have an army in a matter of hours." Robin said.

"That's just it, Robin. I don't know if they're subtle enough." Raven said. "The Lord is not an idiot. He might be occupied with this plan, but…he might be watching us. The more people we tell, the more we expose the information. Even if we wait until the last minute…Herald's process leaves a trace. Maybe the Lord can't detect it. Maybe he can. If he's tipped off…he might abandon the whole process. Or worse."

"The Lord is not an idiot? Really?" Gauntlet said.

"Not a conventional 'I got a D, hooray!' idiot, Rob. He's more of an 'Irregardless is not a word? Really?' idiot." Metatron amended for Raven.

"He could still be watching. He could find out. I almost…went alone. To keep the information close." Raven said. "If we try and bring an army, if we try and bring any help, if we do something like going there now and wrecking his plan before he can start it…well, maybe it would be for the best."

"From your tone, you clearly don't think that." Robin said.

"I think if he gets tipped off…this is a big plan. He'd abandon it…and then somewhere down the line, we'd wake up one morning and find one of Jump's schools has become a smoking hole in the ground. Or that Gauntlet's family has all contracted and died from flesh-eating bacteria. Or…worse. That he'll pay us back by hurting other people, killing other people. Because that's what he does."

"How do we know this is not a trap?" Starfire asked.

"Better question." Cyborg said. "How do we know the Lord isn't using Raven to lure us into a trap?"

"…I don't." Raven said quietly. "I tried to eliminate all possibilities, as best I could…but I don't know. I just…don't know."

None of the other Titans spoke.

"I wanted to present you with the situation. If you want to vote on what to do…I'll go along with whatever the consensus is."

"Kick his ass. I don't care how." Gauntlet said.

"That's the problem Robert. We need to decide how." Scalpel said. "The problem is made worse by how many gray areas there are. We have to decide if we keep the situation contained, or recruit help and run the risks Raven presented. And we don't have much time to decide."

"Five and a half weeks." Sophie said.

"Actually, five weeks, three days, eight hours and thirty-six seconds to decide-nope, five weeks, three days, eight hours, and thirty-FIVE seconds to decide-oh wait, now it's thirty-four. Thirty-three! By gum, time is plotting against us and we've yet to vote. Curse Ricky, and his obvious, newfound chrono-manipulation abilities, robbing us of time we could be using to vote!"

"…Dumbass has a point." Gauntlet said. "…Wow, never thought I'D be saying that. The world really has been turned upside down."

"Saw it coming. And now Raven will declare her sudden lesbianism!" Metatron said, pointing at the sorceress. The Titans looked dully at the chaosling. "Huh. Well, can't always be right."

"Metatron. Gauntlet too. Not now." Robin said. "Time IS of the essence. I'll give you more time to decide…but we need to hold a vote. Secret ballot. Metatron, you get one as well. You're part of this."

"You like me. You really really like me."

Beast Boy looked to Robin with a brow raised, "What about Ry-"

Raven cut off this line of questioning, "Ignoring the fact that her ailments could render her a liability instead of an asset…there is no manner in which to play this as self defense. We will not be asking her to put her head on the chopping block with her father again. Met has already threatened to chain her in the basement with Silkie if she tries."

"Yeah. I guess you're right," he nodded before looking around as if noticing something for the first time, "Surprised she didn't want to hear any of this though. Where is sh-"

"Sleeping," Metatron cut him off in an oddly…clipped way. He was not looking at the shifter though, choosing instead to look passively at Gauntlet. Rob made a point not to meet that stare.

"I'll be here if anyone wants to speak to me. About my assessments. If…that's what you feel is necessary." Raven said.

The next few hours were spent in quiet, private discussion, as the various Titans talked to each other. Raven didn't really need to pay attention to notice that only Metatron and Robin spoke with Savior, and Robin did not speak long. It was expected.

Eventually, the votes were tallied, and Robin read them off. When he was done, no one spoke for a bit.

"…all right then. We've decided to keep this within ourselves. On the small chance anyone wants to come up and examine the votes, feel free." Robin said. No one moved. "If anyone wants to back out, all I ask is for your silence. There will be no other judgment."

Again, no one moved, though unlike the last time, there was a definite air of scales struggling to balance themselves.

"…so that's that." Robin said. He was cut off from his next sentence by Metatron loudly putting his feet up on the table.

"…The thing about Ricky is that Superman stood no chance." Metatron said, leaning back and looking at the ceiling. "In one single attack, he'd have been so much krypto-dust in some REALLY bizarre junkie's pipe. He still won. Because Ricky just CAN'T. Shut. Up."

"…that doesn't help." Scalpel said.

"No? Helped me many times." Metatron said, his chair and feet thudding back down on the ground as he stared at the Titans. "You are not broken. And he will refuse to kill you until you are. He can't help himself. So he'll talk and talk and talk and waste his power, throwing it around. But you are not broken. So he'll keep talking. And that's how you'll beat him." Metatron said, flashing a toothy grin. "Welcome to Ricky Trumping 101."

"We're still not wholly out of the woods." Raven said. "Keeping it to ourselves may better our chances, but he may still be watching us. I don't think he can see inside our Tower, but I suspect he can see us. If we just hole up in the Tower until the day comes, he may get suspicious. We have to try and keep a somewhat ordinary schedule. Keep up appearances. It may not be easy…but it will ensure that if he doesn't know I know, that we'll completely catch him off guard. And crush him into the dust."

"A-fucking-men." Gauntlet said.

"All right Titans." Robin said. "By our nature, we're a reactionary force. We respond to trouble and think on our feet. We rarely get a chance to prepare in-depth for something. We have five and a half weeks. Let's go like they know us to."

"…some bad grammar there Tim." Beast Boy said.

"My mind's on other things. Shoot me." Robin said, and then briefly felt ice crawl in his guts. He tried not to look at Noel, and for the most part succeeded.

Even so, Noel looked away.

* * *

_And soon enough, things dwindled down into an uneasy silence, tension high in the air. The choice had been made, and there was no going back. To some, the situation was truly made into reality by that one decision. To others, it only reaffirmed what they already knew. To all, they saw the shadows of what was to come. Only time that held the answers they wanted, and i_—ACK!" Metatron yelped, ducking to avoid the thrown plastic bowl.

"God, that felt good." Terra declared.

"_Tara Markov, not known for her patience and diplomacy, sank into her somewhat petty, but admittedly amusing, satisfaction, no doubt still mourning the loss of her old goldfish, Wall-_"

"Met! Get off the intercom!" Robin shouted.

"_-y_. Ok, done. On with the plot!"

* * *

"All right, what you got for us Cyborg?" Gauntlet asked.

"Gentlemen…BEHOLD! Corn." Cyborg said, producing a cooked ear of corn and taking a big bite out of it. "Oh yeah, and this."

Cyborg pressed a button, and a work table rose up out of the floor, revealing a white version of Robin's costume.

"…Uh, that's nice and shiny and all but…what's up Cyborg?" Terra said.

"All of you wear armor, to some degree. Except Gar, because of the nature of his unstable molecules or whatever the heck his outfit is made out of, I forget." Cyborg said. "Every now and then I've been trying new things to improve on it. This is my end result. A near-perfect fusion of the best metallurgy, protective synthetic fibers, and cybernetic weaves reinforced by specialized nanotechnology. This outfit actually projects a skin-tight protective field similar to the invulnerability bio-matrix that Kryptionians manifest as part of their powers. It's nowhere as strong, but if Terra wears her equivalent, she could probably take a tank shell to the chest and just walk away with severely bruised ribs. One tank shell, anyway. But you get the picture."

"Great! Now why did it take something like this to get gear like this?" Scalpel asked.

"Because I haven't worked out the power troubles yet. Once everything goes on, you get the field for two hours, max. And you can't turn it back off once you turn it on." Cyborg said. "So you haven't gotten it until now. I'm blowing nearly a quarter of a billion dollars to get an outfit like that for everyone. Thank god for Grayson and whatever resources he has, I'll just say. Considering what we're approaching, it's money well spent."

"I have a question." Metatron said, picking up the white Robin chest piece. "Can we pick colors?"

"No, sorry. While experimenting with heat runoff and proper power flow and a whole bunch of other complicated technical details…basically the only color I've found doesn't cause the dyes to start smoldering is white. Your point?" Cyborg asked.

"Who knew physics had a sense of very clichéd drama?" Metatron commented.

"That's why we have holopins, Metatron." Cyborg said, holding up the hologram device. "I'll custom design some to lay your usual or any color scheme you want on the outfit."

"So what's next Cyborg? The gun that could probably end the battle immediately, but only has a million to one shot of landing?"

"Only by _Discworld_ odds, my friend." Cyborg said, grinning fiercely. "Only by _Discworld_ odds."

* * *

"So what are the Lord's other weaknesses? Besides sunlight, and shutting up?" Robin said to the group assembled in Raven's room.

"Oh that was on Final Jeopardy the other night…" Terra said.

"So was _Men __In__ Black._" Sophie replied, and the two briefly glared at each other.

"The answer is sufficient magic. I'm the only natural magic user here, but we have something that can compensate for that." Raven said, as she opened up a armoire in a corner of the room, revealing the shattered remains of a sword embedded into the wall.

"HOLY SHIT! ANDURIL! I mean…wait." Gauntlet said. "The Fang."

"The blade that banished my father. He Who Dares Bear Fangs At God." Raven said. "Ever since it broke, I've occasionally tried to fix it…never had any luck there. The most we've done with them was when we included two shards into the weapons fashioned for Ryce's arms during the White Call. Since then, she has returned them—after clearly proving that each piece still retains a fair bit of residual magic, given D'xias' volatile reaction to them. Residual magic that, once I properly embed them in you, I can link to your powers."

"Uh…embed?" Sophie said.

"Relax Sophie. It will be like getting an ear piercing." Raven said.

"Sorry, my lobes have been unpierced since day one. Got a better analogy?"

"I will place it under your skin, and allow you to actually throw stuff at the Lord that will hurt him."

"Fuckin' A." Terra said.

"Forget A, I plan to utilize the whole alphabet." Raven said, as she removed the shards of the Fang from where they were. "Who wants to go first?"

* * *

"Do you sleep, Cyborg?" Scalpel said, looking at the looming shape in the Titans' main garage.

"Not always, Nige." Cyborg said, standing in front of a large bank of mechanical tools, looking over them before he turned back to the room-sized vehicle located above them Titans gathered there. "Definitely not going to much these next few weeks. I have to finish this."

"Don't we have the T-Ship though?" Scalpel said. "I ask primarily because it can fly. This…appears to be a submarine."

"It primarily functions as one, yes." Cyborg said. "You can see a plane coming in more ways than an underwater vehicle. I started on it on Aqualad's request, actually. So we could go help him if Atlantis got attacked. Now…"

"We use it to approach." Robin said, looking at the body and curved legs of the advanced submersible. "How fast can it go?"

"This is Atlantean-derived tech. 150 knots." Cyborg said. "Combined with Raven's teleporting abilities, we should be able to get across the Atlantic quicker than a plane, and less detectable. It can beach itself, hold all of us comfortably, and has all sorts of other goodies. I know you feel uncomfortable being underwater Scalpel…but this is about the safest thing you could be underwater in. And as Raven has stressed, surprise is important here."

"I think I'll…just have to grin and bear it, I guess. Um…Is there a way to black out the window?"

"That's part of the stealth, yes."

"What happens if the Lord breaks it?" Terra asked.

"…do we have…oxygen…breathing things…?" Scalpel said, looking a touch green.

"Yes we, but we don't, we shouldn't assume that…look, I'll burn that bridge when we come to it." Cyborg said. "I got my plate full guys. Anything else that needs to be doing, you should all do your best to share the load."

"Where's Raven?" Terra asked. "I think she wanted to talk to you about stuff regarding our specialized armor and the Fang."

"Already done. I think she's with Starfire at the moment." Cyborg said, looking over a large wrench.

"It have a name, Vic?" Robin asked.

"I branched out a bit, Tim." Cyborg said, gesturing to the vehicle. "The T-Oceanus."

"…mocking this is below me. Take it away Rob." Metatron said.

"Rob's not here." Scalpel said.

"Then take it away Gar!"

"He's not here either."

"Then Nigel, this calls for your magnificent repartee."

"…here is my wife. Please take her." Scalpel said with dark sarcasm.

"Spot on."

* * *

"How long have you been designing this, Raven?" Starfire asked, floating up on the roof with her friend, both of them cross-legged in front of each other.

"Since the Alexander Luthor incident. And what happened there." Raven said. "Slowly, in bits and pieces. I've devoted a lot more work to it since the previous Christmas. I think it's almost done, but I'll need your help for the last steps."

"I will help in any way I can." Starfire said.

Raven didn't tell Starfire that, even with all the help the alien would give her now, that there was no help she could give to change certain facts about what she was doing. The risks it could run.

Her best friend was burdened enough by her failures.

* * *

Avoidance was easy when those around seemed more than content to loathe your company. Noel Collins neither welcomed nor detested this new routine, purposefully drifting on his day-to-day. He simply retreated to his room and locked his door, despite knowing no one sought his company. It, at the very least, guaranteed silence.

Or so he thought, before looking up to find a dead prostitute standing in the middle of his room.

"…probably should have picked a better look," the translucent woman sighed, the accented voice not seeming to match her battered and beaten appearance, too light and familiar, "beggars can't be choosers. She was fresh. Lemme make it a lil less weird."

The professional's face skewered up as if in concentration, her dead features rippling much a like the surface of a calm pool disturbed by a fingertip. When its face settled, everything about it had changed, though the clothing still remained much the same. Without her glasses it took an extra moment to recognize her, but Ryce's visage glanced towards a mirror to observe the shade housing her essence.

"Not half bad…still can't get the clothes right though. Doesn't matter…we need to talk," she sighed, the shade drifting before him, going so far as to sit in an odd mimicry of life, "Well, no, that's not right, I guess. _**I**_ need to talk. I have a feelin' you're goin' to sit there pullin' your catatonia crap. I only hope that you will listen despite it."

The man seemed eager to prove her at least halfway right, giving no reaction or acknowledgement.

"…they're goin' t'tell you a lot of things after all this, Noel, maybe not through words but they will 'speak' nonetheless. In five weeks I have no doubt _**he**_ s'goin' to have a lot to say to you too. You need to remember what s'true in the face of their justifiable but foolish anger…and his outright lies. Cause that s'all Ricky has and all he does. Lies. S'all he can have considerin' what he is and where he comes from. He s'somethin' to be abhorred…and perhaps for people far better than me, pitied.

"What happened…s'not who you are. Who you are s'not defined in that one moment of grievous violation and hurt. I cannot promise this place will be whole when the sun sets…I cannot promise some of them will ever come back from where that pathetic fuck sent them…but I can promise that there will always be those who refuse to let him win. You've looked unwittin' pawns of far greater monsters than the Lord in the eyes and opened your arms to them. Hell, you fell in love with one. The sooner you comprehend that, the saner you'll be. You aren't alone in what you are feelin' Noel. This song and dance s'been done to hell and back, amongst even the people who are stupidly questionin' your loyalty. Inner Beasts…Cold, computerized logic…literal demons…the only difference between these puppet masters and Ricky was in subtlety. If I ask nothin' else of you, s'that you see that:

"You are the man who saw the very worst a person can be…and forgave that in them.

"Please…open your eyes and let the people who love you do the same," She whispered as wisps of grey curled around her booted ankles, crawling along jeans and the tight vest across her chest. A lick of it curled about her eyes darkening into the squared frames of her glasses, and the her time was up. And silence fell once more as the shade faded into the air.

Noel didn't know if he preferred it that way.

* * *

Metatron sneezed, waving his hand in front of his nose from the dust in the room. His wanderings that night had brought him to a 'junk room' where the Titans left various items they didn't need at the moment: it clearly hadn't been cleaned in some time. Finding one of Raven's old costumes hung on a wall, Met picked up the hanger and pulled the outfit off of it, turning the cloak and leotard over in his hands.

"You know, despite her reserved upbringing, I think Raven was actually pretty frisky, and this thing was the only way she could express it, what with the Trigon anvil hanging over her head by a thread. Teenage rebellion." Metatron said, turning around to face Sophie. Standing in the doorway, the plus-sized heroine seemed a bit off-put.

"Did you hear me coming? Is that why you started talking?"

"Yes. That's exactly what happened." Metatron said, tossing Raven's outfit aside and picking up what appeared to be a gun. It took Sophie a second to confirm it _was_a gun. It took another for her own gun to be in her hands and aimed at Metatron.

Metatron tilted up his head, smiling at Sophie curiously. A moment later Sophie raised her gun, pressing the hammer back into a down position.

"Reflex. Plus, we've all been…testy lately." Sophie said. "But…it's strange. As odd as you are, I feel I can trust you."

"Why?"

"I'm not sure. It's like I've known you before."

"Heh. Funny, that." Metatron said, lifting up his gun again, the barrel pointed down as he looked at it. "Do you know whose this is?"

"Who can say? Might be some weapon taken off some thug that wasn't needed for…some reason. They keep promising to clean this room out, and don't. No one trusts Ryce to do it without blowing the Tower to kingdom come."

"You're surprised? Shame, Soph." Metatron said, grinning and throwing the gun into the wall. Sophie's eyes flicked across the room at the movement, but she did not budge herself. The weapon thudded off the wall and landed on the floor.

"You should be careful. If that gun had had bullets in it, it could have gone off."

"I knew it didn't." Metatron said, giving Sophie a strange little smile. Sophie glanced at the gun, trying to remember if she saw him check the weapon if it was armed. "Ah! This. I remember this."

Sophie turned back to Metatron as the chaosling crouched down and peered at a destroyed fridge. It appeared that the appliance had been cut in half, and then someone had made a game effort to put it back together before giving up and throwing it in the room.

"Back when I first got here. Were you there, when it happened?" Metatron said, turning to Sophie. "That giant fridge that went flying and Bushido cut in half?"

"I was in the building, but not THERE there."

"Hm. It caused Terra to be buried under a room full of snow." Metatron said, poking at the fridge.

"I know. I giggled more than I should have at that."

"…you'll do fine, Soph." Metatron said, his grin widening into one of true happiness. "Whatever happens, however things end, always remember: Terra was buried in snow. And it was GLORIOUS."

Metatron reached down and actually picked up the broken fridge, hoisting it right side up before he tilted it to the side to drag.

"Whenever you were feeling down, I'd sa-"

The freezer door popped up, and a top hat rolled out from inside and landed at Metatron's feet. Sophie suddenly became aware of a loud buzzing noise.

"…ah. That time of the week, is it?"

Sophie felt the force seize her, and had to grab the doorway as Metatron's body was distorted and sucked into the hat, along with the broken fridge and all the immediate objects around him. She stared with wide eyes where Metatron had been.

A random falling object startled her out of her daze, and she sprinted down the hallway to sound the alarm.

* * *

"…I HAD been wondering where Mumbo's hat had gone." Robin said, several Titans now gathered in the room. Raven had picked the hat up and had been examining it for the past several minutes.

"I hid it in here. For…I can't even remember. Then the Darkseid crisis happened and I completely forgot it was in here." Raven said.

"Unfortunate timing." Scalpel said.

"Yeah."

"So…is he in the hat?" Sophie asked.

"No. He's not in the hat. Neither is the fridge, or anything else that went in. The residual magic of the hat triggered his random teleportation ability. He's gone somewhere else." Raven said.

"…what would have happened if he'd…pulled me in?" Sophie asked.

"I can't say for sure. He's sometimes taken objects with him when he's teleported. He never brought them back. The only person that we could ask would b-" Raven said.

"You rang?" Ryce chimed in dryly by Raven's side making her jump nearly a foot in the air.

"I told you not to do that," she growled.

"Do we want to get into what one has told the other t'do to make things go easy peasy in this Tower?" Ryce asked tilting her head and looking at Raven over the rims of her glasses. Raven tensed. Always good to know when she had people still angry with her.

"As for what would have happened," Ryce continued wrapping around them to take the hat and turn it over in her hands carefully, "Well…the very nature of chaos renders the answer to ev'ry question into 'I don't know.' Put simply, y'd have gone along for the ride Soph. Sometimes that ride takes y'to the very ends of the universe. Two or three times Adam and I ended up in the basement…there was also that one where we ended up in…ahem…_Nigel__'__s_ room. Pretty sure y'remember that one," she cringed as Sophie just blushed at THAT awkward memory.

"So when will he be back?" Robin asked.

"When I say the answer to ev'ry thing is 'I don't know,' do you hear, 'HI Tim! Ask me questions, cause the answers will be TOTALLY varied'?" Ryce asked before cringing visibly and seeming to shrink down where she stood, "…sorry…uncalled for. I jus'…I dunno where or when he is and how long it will be, Tim. S'never somethin' I've been able to predict."

"…right. I'd better start re-drawing the plans to compensate for his absence." Robin said.

"It does not bode well that you haven't already. I mean…s'Met," Ryce sighed before giving a wry little laugh, "Y'know…for someone defined by s'innate ability t'be unpredictable. Met's GRAND at disappearing at jus' the worst time. Makes for a fun mystery though," she chuckled as she flipped the hat about in her hands and rested it at an angle on her head. Leaning back into a broken chair she grinned at the two shaking her head.

Raven didn't reply as Robin left nor respond to Ryce's running commentary in general.

Sophie could tell that the incident wasn't Raven's fault. She could also tell from the brief look that crossed Raven's faces that she didn't believe that.

* * *

"All right Pangloss. Let me know what's in the tank."

"Pardon?" The voice said on the other end of the phone.

"What's the dark secret power of the Gauntlet that I don't dare use at the expense of my soul? You know, ALL items of power have one."

"It doesn't have one, Robert. Nothing that would help you with the Lord, anyway."

"…you knew?"

"Not until you called just now. And only because I decided to pull the thread about the different tone in your voice."

"…can you…"

"No, Robert. You should know that."

"Then what good ARE you?"

"…I'll forgive you for that because I know you're under some stress."

"No, don't forgive me! I want to know! You could fight him on even terms!"

"Because he IS stronger than me."

"…what."

"I know, it surprised me too, the first time I figured it out. I can do some damn impressive things, if I do say so myself, but…he dwarfs me. So yeah. Me showing up wouldn't quite have the effect you think."

"Then what do I do? I'm not MEANT for this sort of crap! I've decided that! I am not genetically meant to have villains like this! I'm supposed to fight guys like Dr. Draken, or Dr. Doofenschmirz, or X The Eliminator! I'm not supposed to go up against freaking Nietzschean supermen wannabes!"

"I don't recall anyone giving you a choice."

"So does mom. She slams doors for hours." Gauntlet said. "Okay, so what DO I do?"

"Well, you know that power you used to do that Shining Finger crap from that crap anime?"

"I wouldn't use the word crap, but yeah."

"You theoretically COULD do that. But five weeks isn't enough time to get to that level at will."

"I just need to do it ONCE."

"Then it looks like it's time to play Yoda."

"You mean you're coming over here?"

"No. As you'll recall, Yoda mostly flung verbal abuse and obsessed about stew."

"Oh don't you dare…"

"Gotta go, the stew's about done. Too old you are. Not ready are you. Meathead. Ciao!"

CLICK.

"…FFFFFFFFFF...!"

* * *

"That may have been the third loudest profanity I ever heard, Friend Rob." Starfire said, cleaning out a ringing ear with a finger.

"Which ones were louder?" Gauntlet groused.

"That's not important…what did you learn, Friend Rob?"

"Jack and shit."

"That did not sound like a malediction fueled by lack of knowledge."

"Nothing GOOD. I was hoping for a deal with the devil ultimate Gauntlet power and was told…well, that shining finger crap I pulled is doable, but it could kill me. Then he didn't tell me how I could do it at will. Then he said a non-sequitur and left."

"If I recall from your reports, the Shining Finger was done when all your allies in the desert combined their power with yours. I…do not know if the same trick would work twice."

"Hence the 'it could kill me' part. I think. I don't know. The guy is so damn CRYPTIC, and I don't know if he's cryptic to play games with me or cryptic because he doesn't KNOW things."

"Did you ask him…if the Lord knows we're coming?"

"Damnit to hell. I didn't even think so."

"Can you?"

"I'll try tomorrow. I don't feel like putting up with his crap right now."

"…you do not want to come." Starfire said quietly.

"Who _would?_" Gauntlet said. "But if I'd wanted to back out, I would have done it when Robin presented the option. I'm going. Don't worry about me chickening out."

"I am not." Starfire said. "…I want to go back too, sometimes. Many times. Not just before we learned about that Halloween. Back to the days when we always knew where we stood."

"I just…I know how Robin felt about Slade now." Gauntlet said. "This guy is sitting out there, just laughing at us, and unless Raven has something in her spell book she hasn't used before, I don't think we can ever beat him meaningfully. Hell, I honestly wonder for all his talk, if Metatron didn't run away."

"That, I doubt. He is very strange, and…horning in, is that the phrase?"

"You definitely could have mis-used it worse."

"Despite his horning in on your territory, he is not one to run away. He is simply…cursed, sometimes. As for Raven, she is far smarter than the Lord could ever give her credit for."

"Smart, yes. But a smart guy with a spear isn't going to bring down a tank, no matter what _Civilization_ would tell us."

"…Our lives are not based on electronic algorithms. Not even confusing ones like that." Starfire said. "We have a cause, and a belief. As does he. We can only bring them both to bear, and believe ours are the stronger."

"Yeah." Gauntlet said, sitting down with a sigh. "I wouldn't mind getting an ace in the hole to go with that belief, but yeah."

"We are preparing as many as we can."

"No, me, I, Gauntlet. I want an ace in the hole. I don't want another fight with him where all I can do is punch him and watch him regenerate. I think I've got one if I can figure out how to overclock it again. But I've got nothing when it comes to figuring out how to do it."

"Don't force it. Surprise may be best in all cases, this time."

"Yeah, but only so much." Gauntlet said. "I know most of you guys are going to be spending a lot of time in training. Count me in. It may not be a room of spirit and time, but I think that between you, and me, there might be a few bits of true potential to unlock. Maybe I'll even hit up Hal, or Kyle, or Stewart, or heck, even Guy, if Robin allows me. Conceal why I want some tips from them. I don't know how much surprise we have here, but I KNOW that bastard always sees me as a clown. I'll make damn sure I'm a poor one."

Starfire stared. Gauntlet was about to explain, when her eyes brightened.

"Ah! As in, he will not be laughing."

"You're learning, Star."

"I have the best teachers." Starfire said, giving Gauntlet a closed-eye smile.

"Thanks for listening, Star. I had to get that off my chest. I can't wait to get this over with, just so I don't have to be angsty and stuff."

"You are not the one I am concerned about." Starfire said, her smile fading.

"Oh? Who are you worried about?"

"Ryce."

Rob cringed, unprepared. "I-"

"I know," Starfire said, "I do. And I won't tell you change anything…simply, to reconsider. If nothing else, she's been the most vocally repentant of our three companions," she observed him as several emotions conflicted in his eyes, and decided not to press the issue. "And there's also…well, you should know."

* * *

Dust in a room.

You never realized how much dust collected in a room until you suddenly found yourself spending a majority of your time there. Over the years, Noel's room had remained Spartan, not for lack of things to put in it, but because he spent so much time elsewhere. Over time, he'd neglected to clean it himself, usually assigning one of Cyborg's small robots to do it for him.

The irony that the first major task Noel had been asked to do for the Titans was clean up their room was not lost on him. It was why Cyborg had invented said small robots (Fixit had helped). Apparently, they hadn't been scheduled to tidy up Noel's in the immediate future.

Noel didn't feel like doing it either.

In all honesty, despite Starfire's warning, despite Ryce's attempt, Noel wanted to plunge into despair. It was one thing to be manipulated into attacking your hated father, and another to constantly slip into asshole behavior. It was another to be reduced to such a state that you would kill the only family you had and think it was the only way to go. Terra had been right in her accusations. He hadn't lived up to what he preached: he couldn't see how much worse he could have failed at it.

It would be easier to just give up.

Then again, it would have been easier to give up when his mom had died. Or when he'd been locked up in the loony bin. Or any of the times when the odds seemed completely hopeless.

He hadn't then. Why now?

Was 'That was then, this is now' really so strong?

Was the Lord's shadow so deep?

It was that old chestnut that had driven Noel forward in the end. A focus. A target. He had no idea if his friends could ever forgive him, or if he could forgive himself. Even if they did, he could not think of how to atone. Maybe he never would.

All he had was his duty. Part of him knew this fact was mirrored in all the other Titans. The other part knew that probably didn't make much difference.

So he kept out of the Titans' way, communicating to Robin through email. Robin, at the time, seemed to prefer that as well. Noel kept abreast of the Titans' preparations, and had joined them for strict, intense training sessions, treating it as business and slipping away when it was done. None of his allies complained, or really showed any opinion towards his actions. Considering they all probably had their own burdens to work through, he did not resent them for this fact.

When this was all over…things would probably change. Maybe not for the better.

But for now, it was the illusion. If the Lord was watching, keep his eyes clouded to the truth. Keep fighting crime and occasionally attending social events, like nothing had changed. Let the Lord think his mortal foes knew nothing.

Strike for his heart.

Dust in a room.

It was that dust in his room that kept Noel away from it as much as possible. He'd always considered himself harsh in his training, but he'd managed to crank up the dial another notch. The fact that he couldn't bring himself to invite or interact with his teammates probably had something to do with that.

Train strength. Train speed. Train control. Push himself to a new peak, if just for a bit. Maybe find an answer…

Or so Noel had thought, until Nigel walked into the room.

Noel stopped in mid-procedure, more surprised than he should have been. Scalpel regarded him with cool, blank eyes. Noel shut down his simulation, regarding the alien with a questioning look. If Nigel had wanted to train by himself, he wouldn't be booting Noel out. Even with the secret revealed, that was not Nigel's way.

Scalpel said nothing in the end. He just produced his glaive and gestured at the Titan, Savior stared a few more seconds, then rolled his shoulders and assumed a combat pose.

Savior had no idea if it meant anything, as the two proceeded to battle each other. He suspected if Nigel was willing to offer absolution yet, he would have done it more directly. As it was, it was just another training session. It would not be the last the two had, as the days counted down.

It didn't stop Noel's questions, or the terrible possibilities he tried to keep in the back of his mind.

Dust in a room.

Dust in a room.

* * *

The days counted down. The Doom of Damocles. Had Metatron been around, he probably would have commented on such a turn of phrase, but he remained gone. Despite themselves, the Titans found themselves coping with his absence.

"This is a message for everyone. I'll give specifics at the end of it." Robin said, the machines whirring quietly in his dark room as they recorded. "I want you to understand why I did what I did. In all honesty, I hope this message is never sent…"

"Computer, open file Z-Omega." Cyborg said in his own room, his body plugged into his personal machines. "New draft. The last will and testament of Victor T. Stone…"

"I just never really had anything like this. Always reacting, nothing ever really like this…" Beast Boy said in the dark booth. "I know I'm in good hands. I just…needed to say it out loud."

"…I wish I could help you some more, my son. But I understand your need for secrecy." The priest said in the other end. "I will pray for you."

"Thanks father. I'll need it." Beast Boy said. "I'd like to say I don't…but I'm not that smart, and I'm not that stupid."

"I think I've written this about two hundred times." Terra said, turning the envelope over in her hands. "Never really could find the right words."

Starfire said nothing, as Terra turned the envelope over a few more times.

"Brion should know. I…wish I could tell him in another fashion…but this is the only sure thing." Terra said, as she finally slid the letter into the box. Provided no one retrieved it, said box would be sent to the post office in three days.

"You will find the words." Starfire said. Terra smiled slightly at the alien.

"I just wish we could send something to your planet."

"I am not concerned." Starfire said. "They know how I feel."

In the end, Gauntlet had never been able to get ahold of Pangloss. When he'd tried to contact him again, his mother had informed him that Pangloss had left to attend the "Annual Fifth Dimensional Beings Conference." When Gauntlet had frustratingly pointed out that Pangloss was, for all his strength, NOT a fifth-dimensional being, his mother had replied that she had wondered about that herself.

He'd never come back. Gauntlet had no idea if Pangloss was just being Pangloss, or had known something was coming and didn't want to face it. Most of him refused to accept the latter option. Pangloss was a lazy leech, but he wasn't that selfish and cold. Probably. Hopefully.

That wasn't the part Gauntlet hated the most. The part he hated that much was that he couldn't talk to his parents before he left. Robin had done nothing to indicate he couldn't, and Gauntlet doubted he ever would…but the secret had to be kept. Gauntlet was the son of a spy. He knew the value of intelligence.

He wrote an email instead. Had Robin asked for a summary, Gauntlet would have encapsulated it thusly: "Sorry it came to this. I know it came out of nowhere, but we were trying to get the element of surprise. Tell Amy and all the rest of my friends about this…but don't let them go off and try and avenge us. If he can still be stopped, this is a job for the Justice League and BULWARK. Attached are all our files for Dad. I love you all."

It was staring at the send button that made Gauntlet realize that his loathing towards the Lord had not faded one iota. Gauntlet had always had trouble holding onto hate. It just wasn't him.

And now, even as he pushed himself into his training, aware of the blond watching him from the entrance—she was always there, hoping for a chance to offer some assistant, to talk, to just know she wasn't hated—Gauntlet knew that The Lord had finally pushed him to that peak. That depth.

Despite himself, and all the men he admired, Gauntlet wondered for the first time in his life if there really was a way out of that chasm.

He supposed, sighing, that if there was, it began by rebuilding. So he turned.

"Hey Ryce," he called, trying not to smirk when the girl jumped in surprise at the sudden acknowledgement. "Can you pass me the water-bottle? I'm parched."

The angel stared for a second, before tripping over herself to do so. "Y-Yes!" She said, a flushed, watery expression coming over her, a small, shy smile that made Gauntlet smile back.

It was a start.

"What's that?" Scalpel asked.

"This is a list of things I plan to do during the course of my life." Morgue said. "I'm leaving it here. When we get back, I'm going to start checking them off. I suspect we'll have earned a vacation."

"Yes…perhaps two." Scalpel said, laying a clawed hand on Morgue's shoulder. She looked up and grinned, taking his metal digits in hers.

Scalpel tried not to show that part of him never wanted to let go. Or the other part that wanted to 'tap' Sophie on the back of the head, inject her with tranquilizers, and tuck her away in a safe place until this ended in whatever way it did.

Instead he watched Sophie write.

She had a long list.

The old flowers were still there, resting on Crystal Collins' grave. Apparently, there had not been much in the way of wind, or maybe the graveyard attendants were exceptional. Or lazy.

The last time he'd been here, Noel had had the location repeatedly swept. This time, he didn't even bother wearing a holopin. It seemed rather pointless, with the graveyard empty and quiet.

Noel laid the new flowers down, and stood by the grave site for a while. He wanted to say something, but no words came.

Maybe the time for words was over.

A petal detached from the new bouquet as Noel turned and left.

No one else visited the graveyard that day.

"That's really all I have to say." Robin finished. "Well, one more thing. It really doesn't need to be said…but I will anyway. Jason…Damian…if you're somehow listening to this…I do hope this congratulations is earned. And Dick, Babs, Steph, Cass…I love you. It was an honor, and MY honor. Good bye."

Robin shut the recording off.

"…Bruce…Dad…Mom…" Robin said in the empty dark. "If it is my time…I hope I'll do you proud before it."

Everything was done.

Raven knew that, as she floated in her room. Her team was as ready as they could possibly be under the circumstances. She was ready, her efforts having borne greater fruit than she had expected.

The only hole was Metatron. It was the night before they left, and he still hadn't returned. Normally, Raven would have made do. But after Christmas the previous year, not to mention the advice he'd given her several days before she'd told the team the secret, and the fact Metatron seemed to have some strange connection to the Lord…

Plus he was growing on her. She couldn't tell why. Maybe it was the fact that he was the only one spared the grief that had befallen them during the events of that Halloween night. Or maybe it was the fact that even if he hadn't been, he would have reacted the same way he had now. He seemed halfway on the road to barking madness most of the time, but for the past few years of her life Metatron had served as her fool, in the Shakespearean sense. The only one who spoke the truth.

For that, she had to try.

"Azarath Metrion Zinthos…Azarath Metrion Zinthos…" Raven chanted to herself, feeling her cloak swirl around her. She was sending a basic message out into the ether: having no idea where Metatron had gone, it was the best option she had. A real shot in the dark, but considering Metatron could provide another shot AGAINST the dark, it was worth it. "Azarath Metrion Zinthos…"

The world was so much bigger than many realized in their lifetimes. Sometimes that was a blessing…

And sometimes, as Raven felt her message impact against something, it was anything but.

Raven never knew exactly what happened. She might have touched Metatron directly, or interacted with something in his wake. A dark possibility that she didn't allow herself to think about was that Metatron had been heading back, and she'd knocked him away again.

She didn't really know, as the bolt arced back across the curve of dimensions and slammed into her head.

Her eyes went wide as images poured across her vision, too garbled and mashed together to make any sense. Familiar faces leered out of the soup of chaos only to vanish back in immediately, and whatever she heard altered in tone and language so much that she might as well have tried to divine an answer out of some freshly released vomit. The barrage of confusion ricocheted around her mind for an indeterminable length of time. Raven was vaguely aware her ears and nose were bleeding.

But the last image was crystal clear, and made Raven recoil in horror as she collapsed on the floor.

It couldn't be a coincidence. The last person she saw. Clearly. The white-skinned goth girl with the ankh.

Death of the Endless.

"No." Raven said in quiet horror. "No! Not like this! Don't show your face like this!" Raven was vaguely aware she was crawling and groveling in a way that drastically unsuited her, but she didn't care. "TELL ME! WHO'S GOING TO DIE? WHAT DO YOU MEAN? WHAT…die…"

Raven's voice trailed off. The kaleidoscope of images that had preceded Death's impassive face were already fading, like it had been a dream. Only the omen of the Endless Raven knew best remained. And it was an omen. It couldn't be anything else.

…Ryce. She could talk to Ryce. Demand answers. A connection, a dial up to her father, or to Death itself, herself. She could force the issue.

Raven stared at the ground, barely aware of the blood dripping on the floor from her face. Her voice was so quiet even Nigel would have barely been able to hear it.

"I can't be human. Not for this."

Her words did not mean that she wanted to embrace her father's demonic heritage. Far from it. But after so many years of being able to understand her random prophetic flashes, the thought that she would have to approach the future the same way as the rest of the humanity, not knowing what exactly was to come…

The Spectre had said she would bear a terrible price. The final bill was coming due.

Though she knew it was all in her head, Raven still swore she heard the Lord laughing at her.

* * *

The sun rose on another day. The fated day.

Armor was laid over body. Belts tightened. Boots were laced up and strapped in. Gloves settled onto hands. Masks were slipped on. Capes fell over backs. Hats were daintily placed onto heads.

Sophie sat on her bed in full costume as Nigel finished slipping the last of his weapons onto his form. Silently, she stood up, and the two headed out the door.

They also didn't recognize Cyborg, clad once more in the advanced battle armor he had brought to bear against the Black Lanterns last Halloween. Savior, after having been back in his classic white and blue duds, was once again wearing the black and red color set of his evil doppelganger Christmas. No one commented on the irony, or guessed at Noel's intent.

The Titans gathered in the basement, everyone solemn, grim, and dressed for war. Terra had cut her hair short, to prevent anyone from grabbing it, and was actually wearing pants covered with some sort of flexible grey granite she'd developed. Starfire was wearing an armored headpiece that kept hers out of the way, as well as the Tamarian armor she broke out whenever she was serious. Scalpel's usually crazy colors seemed far more muted than normal. Even Gauntlet had traded in his t-shirt and jeans for a Bulwark combat uniform (or rather the armor replica Cyborg had made of one).

Looking very much out of place amongst the battle ready in her jeans and an old sweatshirt, Ryce drifted quietly through them. Her eyes were dry as she made her way to each Titan and spoke a few soft words. The specifics did not matter, the meaning all the same. Some responded, some barely seemed to register she was talking.

Not a one escaped without a tight hug, Terra's eyes nearly fell from her head when the normally combative teenager even embraced her. By the time Ryce moved away from them delivering whatever oddly hollow-feeling message she could to Gauntlet, who smiled gently and whispered something back at her, her eyes stung bitterly even as she laughed.

"…Adam has not returned." Raven said, her black cloaks wrapped around her.

"Makes you want to slap him and hug him all at once when he finally does, aye?" Ryce replied, her voice rough. Raven gave her a tiny smirk.

"Right. We can't wait any longer. Wish he could be here, but his nature had other ideas." Robin said, turning towards Cyborg. "Vic?"

"T-Oceanus is ready." Cyborg said, pointing up. The apparatus above the Titans began to lower the giant submersible down, even as the floor began to lower down with it, heading for the underwater bay where they would launch.

"Everyone set then? Nothing left forgotten?" Robin said. No one had a reply. "Then let's go Titans. Let's go."

"…we're going out tonight." Gauntlet hummed quietly to himself. "To kick out his damn lights. Do everything we want. Break everything in sight…until his world stops turning while we burn it to the ground tonight."

And as the Titans, one by one, walked past their maid and loaded up into the T-Oceanus and the machine launched off towards the Lord's base, Gauntlet continued his quiet tune, several other Titans humming along. Ryce stood vigilant, witness to their departure.

"We got no fear, no doubt, all in, balls out…"


	2. Bad Romance

Chapter 2: Bad Romance

"_With bare boughs rattling in the lonesome winds_

_And the dark woodlands brooding over all_

_Not even lightened by the rare dim sun_

_Which made squat shadows out of men_

_They called it Cimmeria_

_Cimmeria, land of Darkness and deep Night.__"_

-The Nemedian Chronicles

"_And the Joker pulls crimes in such an orderly manner_

_He must write it down in an evil day planner_

_His henchmen are psycho and expendable_

…_yet somehow completely dependable."_

_-The Dark Knight Is Confused_, The Key of Awesome

_**The human brain.**_

_**Such a complicated instrument. Little more than a mass of meat capable of sending small amounts of chemical and electrical signals. Unimpressive when viewed as the sum of its parts.**_

_**Yet it pulled its species up from all its fellows, and made them master of the world. It let them construct buildings, lead armies across nations, and decipher the hidden natures of the world. For some, it let them tap the primal forces of existence. For others, it transformed them into something akin to those forces. It took this little mudball orbiting a small star, and somehow made it a vital, central part of the universe.**_

_**It made me what I am.**_

_**Yet**__**…**__**that fact reminds me of the other end of the blade.**_

_**So easy to break, the human mind. So easy to change.**_

_**Flaws hardwired in besides its gifts. Fallacies in logic and observation, seeing patterns where there are none, denying truth like it will disappear without your cognition. Capable of accepting, and mastering, just about anything**__**…**__**and so few rising to the challenge. So much lost. So much destroyed.**_

_**Marissa Mori was just one of them. So much potential in her brain, destroyed by her disgusting failure of a father. Failed in turn by those Titans, Raven and Robin, an impotent pair who could do nothing but try and contain the damage when it spilled onto those who deserved it.**_

_**I did not accept this, much like all of their wretched societal miscarriages. So I fixed it. Not an easy task**__**…**_

"_Who are you?__"_

_A simple question. Young Marissa Mori stared at the Very Black Cat, sitting, as still as a clay statue, and regarding her with contrasted eyes. One black, one white._

_The deep unease clawing at the girl was not lessened, her voice echoing in the empty, faded alleyways and streets. Not a shadow stirred. Not a response returned._

_The girl swallowed, __"__W-Where am I?__"_

_The cat maintained its silence--why was this surprising, cats can__'__t talk--and Marissa bit back a whimper, her question ignored._

_But she knew._

_That store._

_That crack on the pavement._

_That old oak tree with every other branch twisted and broken._

_She knew._

"_But this CAN__'__T be Jump!__"_

_No answer._

"…_WHERE IS EVERYONE?__"_

_Marissa whirled around, demanding answers of the empty streets, answers that the cat had denied her._

_She got more stillness. There wasn__'__t even wind._

_She looked back, and let out a panicked whimper. The cat was gone._

…_No. It wasn__'__t._

_It was walking away._

_Relief clashed with anxiety. __"__Where am I?__"__ She pleaded of the small animal._

_This time, the cat did not ignore her. It turned to look at her briefly. Very briefly. A split second in time._

_Acknowledgement._

_Then it turned and resumed its walk down the street._

_Marissa didn__'__t want to be alone. Not now. __"__W-Wait!__"__ Again, she wondered if she was dreaming._

_But she COULDN__'__T be. The thought kept repeating, even as she followed the cat through the man-made desolation, through the empty, still blocks of cement given dull purpose. It couldn__'__t be._

_Too detailed. Too concise. Suffocating lucidity._

_It was real. And she was alone._

_She wanted answers._

_And the Very Black Cat, a paradoxical shining beacon to guide her__…__it was part of it._

_She didn__'__t know how---she knew how. It was._

_Her cat seemed to be part of it._

_**I have cut myself off from humanity and its limitations. In my hands are all answers. I brought peace and sanity to Marissa Mori**__**'**__**s mind, through guidance given to her in dreams. It was a troublesome path**__**…**__**but that is another story. What matters is I succeeded. I gave her a chance to use her potential, as it should be used.**_

_**In the service of the future.**_

_**The brain. I know it well.**_

_**I also know the heart well. Of its many, many dark corners.**_

_**In curing Marissa, I learned to use them as a source of strength.**_

_**Now, I will use them to change the world.

* * *

**_

Its name was Poveglia Island. Until that morning, it had been located in a lagoon in Venice, Italy.

It's absence was not noticed for some time, for very good reasons. No one lived on Poveglia; no one had lived on the island for decades. It's most recent use had been for grape-growing, and even that had been abandoned for years. Many people, knowing of its history, had probably wished for its disappearance.

When it came, no one noticed until that evening, when they looked across the Venetian Lagoon to watch the sun set only to find the distant shape of the island gone. Boats sent out by curious observers confirmed it. The island had vanished off the face of the earth.

Those that knew of its past could only feel a chill in their bones over this supposed phenomenon.

If they knew why it was gone, they would have felt far more than a chill.

----------------

The other island's name was _La Voix De Mort._ Located around two hundred miles off the coast of France, its name came from the strange sounds the water made as it flowed through the island's many shoals, noise whose producer had destroyed more than a few ships and men over the centuries. Those that survived learned to avoid the shoals, and christened the island with what it had become known for: a voice for death. What little flora and fauna had been on the island had been picked clean by human scavengers and the animals they had brought during their voyages: said animals had themselves died off, leaving a rough dozen square miles of dead rock overseen by a small mountain and, several miles distant, an eons-extinct volcano.

It made it easier for the Lord to carve a chunk out of it. Specifically, so he could put something very special in its place.

Something he'd gone to great trouble to steal.

----------------

Genocide knew how strong their 'benefactor' and leader was. He'd taken them, many-time losers and never-weres, cast-offs or victims of a cruel, judgmental society, and he'd remade them into giants. Marissa Mori, who had been with the Lord even longer, and been the recipient of many gifts of her own, knew it even better.

Yet when he appeared above them in the dark night sky, dragging the charred carcass of the island he'd ripped from distant waters and teleported across the world to where they were now, they were all struck by a sense of terrified awe. So many had tried to conquer the world. It seemed possible they might be in the presence of the creature that would succeed.

"Poveglia Island." The Lord said, his voice echoing in Genocide and Marissa's head as he lowered himself down in front of him, masses of dark arcing power shooting from his body and cloaks as he began lowering the island down to its distant placement. "The last vital part needed for the end of the world."

"…WHY?" Carcinogen yelled.

"Because it's a bastion of human ignorance, terror, and suffering." The Lord said, continuing to lower the island. "The Romans first used it as a place to hold victims of the plague. Thousands died on it then. And then, when the Black Death swept through Europe, it was used for that purpose again. And not just the plague. Anyone with any signs of sickness were sent to this island, and tossed into massive pits of dead bodies before being set aflame, whether you were alive or dead. Tens of thousands died there that time; they say charred bones STILL wash up on shore. And then, at the turn of the 20th century, a lunatic asylum was built on it. Soon more dead joined all those who came before, courtesy of a doctor madder than any of his patients. They say he caused so much agony that a white mist arose from the ground and strangled him, though I suppose it could just as easily have been his patients finally turning on him. Since then, the island had been shunned, and rightfully so. Just one more of the world's many hidden atrocities." The Lord said. "Until now, anyway."

The remains of Poveglia crashed down into the carved-out segment of the mountain, a gigantic eruption of dark energies fusing the two islands together. Just like that, the noise faded, leaving only the eerie silence that had pervaded _La Voix_ since the Lord had come to it.

"Now it serves a greater purpose. It, and all it's seen. As do you all." The Lord said, turning towards his minions. "We have twelve days. Twelve days before the celestial bodies are fully in position. Twelve…well, technically eight days before the ley lines beneath our feet properly intersect, but they'll remain that way for four months afterward, so that is beside the point. You all have your instructions and your equipment. Get to work. _Carpe Noctem._"

"…what?" Hyperthermia said.

"…It's Latin. It means 'seize the night'." The Lord said.

"…you want us to grab the night?"

"It means GO WORK HARD, NOW." The Lord growled. Genocide got the message and scampered off.

"I am spoiled by your company, Miss Mori." The Lord said, turning back towards where he'd fused Poveglia to Voix. Getting no response, he glanced over to the holographic controls Marissa was working, as a large shape loomed in the distant waters, bringing the many needed supplies that would be required over the next few days. "Miss Mori?"

Marissa didn't reply, her eyes focused entirely on the controls. She knew the odds of crashing her 'transport barge' was low, but not low enough that she could put it on autopilot. This was a chance for her master to win, and she refused to risk even the slightest foul up.

The Lord snapped his fingers. The motion had a harsher, more organic sound than if a normal person had done it. Almost as if he'd actually snapped a bone.

"Gah! What?" Marissa said, before a flush of deep shame covered her features. "Sorry Master."

"I said I was spoiled by your company. Though I am reminded of where it lacks. No offense." The Lord said. "Give me a timeframe."

"…uh, as of the moment…maybe seven hours for all the stuff to arrive. Eight days construction time, barring unforeseen…stuff…" Marissa stammered, still flustered. "Two more days, at most, for anything else."

"Good. Once you're done placing your machines to begin construction, I have another task for you." The Lord said, presenting Marissa with a map. "This island is riddled with caves, and I plan to have high defenses. Just in case. Scout the locations, then decide where you want to place your products. In theory, they won't be needed. In theory."

"Yes sir." Marissa said. There was no reply, and she returned to work. Much to her surprise, when she looked up nearly twenty minutes later the Lord was still there. "Sir?"

"Pondering some possible frivolities, Miss Mori. About your teammates." The Lord said. "Nothing you need to be concerned about, just some aspects to smooth over and whatnot. How are things preceding?"

"On schedule sir."

"Excellent. Let us work then. The 'kingdom of heaven' is a condition of the heart-not something that comes 'upon the earth' or 'after death'." The Lord said, vanishing in a shifting haze of black mist. The fact that Marissa knew who he was quoting, despite her not actually saying so, pleased the Lord. He suspected she would have known even if she hadn't seen him recently reviewing the works of the great philosopher. Genocide might still need some work, especially the Jamaican, but Marissa would accomplish whatever he tasked her to do.

Of that, he had no doubt.

* * *

For a while, Marissa Mori didn't even notice the temperature dropping. If her instruments hadn't registered it, she might not have noticed at all.

Even so, she didn't pay it much mind. Her techno-suit had self-regulating heating technology that would have allowed her to work outside in Siberia, if she so wanted. In fact, she'd invented it to work outside Ginnungagap (as rarely as she had to do that). Considering what the Lord had just done, and was doing, some temperature fluctuations didn't seem all that odd.

The whispering a few minutes later, however, was not as dismissible. Mainly because, normally for Marissa, she would have been able to ignore that too.

Before she realized she didn't recognize the voice. She'd had a problem with voices during her life, but they were all familiar to her. This one was not.

"_Little broken one…"_

"_Like us…"_

"_Just like us…"_

Marissa tried to keep her face passive, like she'd been taught, and resumed surveying the site she'd been given.

"_Can hear us…"_

"_Can hear what awaits her…"_

"_Been alone so long…"_

"_Join us…"_

Marissa tried to ignore the whispers, devoting her thoughts to resources, placement, and battle considerations.

"_Soonsoonsoon…"_

The whispers did not continue after that. Marissa dismissed them and began taking notes. She couldn't waste time with her problems.

* * *

"So what's your damage?"

"Huh?" Marissa said, turning to look at Hyperthermia. She'd known the woman was nearby, via her scanners, but she hadn't expected her new 'teammate' (Marissa primarily thought of her, and the other members of the new Genocide, as 'enhancement talent', which is what the Lord had told her they were. She doubted he'd said the same to them, but Marissa wasn't going to cause any friction for her master by telling THEM that) to wander over and try to strike up a conversation.

"The Lord doesn't pick prom queens and most likely to succeeds'. Maybe I'm new, but I can definitely tell that." Hyperthermia said, flexing her fingers, shimmers of heat flowing around the digits. "So what screwed YOU up?"

"…I was chosen for my use…like you were…"

"Please Mary, don't piss in my ear and tell me it's raining." Hyperthermia said. "We got picked because we didn't explode when he tried to empower us, like all those other poor sons of bitches. Apparently you aren't important enough for him to test the process. Or too important. Who cares? Maybe you were just picked to be a mechanic for that smug bastard tucked away in that tower the Lord's building."

"What…I…." Marissa stammered.

"Kyleona, do be quiet." A new voice said. Marissa's eyes snapped towards the dark mist that had appeared nearby, and quickly lowered her head and blanked her expression. "You don't require any more break time. Resume training."

"…just saying." Hyperthermia said.

"If I want you to assess your superior officer, I'll tell you to. Otherwise, do try and keep the assumptions to a minimum." The Lord said. Hyperthermia walked off without another word. "Resume working, Miss Mori."

"Yes sir."

"And do not be troubled by her implications. By the nature of what she is, she's trying to figure out the whole story, and failing."

Marissa had no reply, something she regretted later.

When the whispering started again, and took a long time to go away.

* * *

"Sir, may I ask you a question?"

The Lord didn't look at Kyleona Lynessa. He didn't have to, and part of the reason he didn't anyway was her so-called costume. Unlike her compatriots, who wore something that at least RESEMBLED a 'combat ensemble' , Kyleona had used his blank slate magical outfit to clothe herself in a bright white track-suit with white sneakers and a hoodie, flames emblazoned on the legs, arms, and shoes. Kyleona thought it looked cool: The Lord thought it looked horrendously cheap and tacky. Then again, he hadn't expected poor white trash to have much in the way of fashion. As long as she used the powers he'd implanted in her in his service and followed orders, he'd not nitpick. He had his own personal inclinations as well, and even he had to admit they didn't always look good in retrospect.

"What is it?" The Lord said, keeping his eyes on the ground, his hands pressed flat on the stone beneath his feet. Hyperthermia didn't know what he was doing, and wasn't curious enough to ask.

"Why is…"

"Because she has use in and of herself, with her own gifts." The Lord said, standing up. "Your use required outside interference from me. Why does this matter, Kyleona?

"…I don't like taking orders from someone who I could melt with a wave of my hand."

"The only reason you can do THAT, is because of me. And the only reason you think that way is because of me." The Lord said, his tone growing low and dangerous. "Believe me when I say I have far more use for her than for you. Accept what you're given. Is being one of the few to survive not enough? Would you prefer to have ended up like Simms, his own powers driving him mad?"

"…guess so." Hyperthermia said, hopping down from her rock perch. The Lord smirked wickedly.

"Ambition is good. But not understanding it is not. I speak from personal experience." The Lord said. "Keep this in mind should you wish to ask any more questions."

"How do you do that?"

"Pardon?"

"You're all black shadow stuff, how do you make it so your eyes and teeth are white?"

"Do you know how sight works, Kyleona?" The Lord said. "It involves light and the brain. I had abilities of the mind before I ascended, and a lord of darkness knows a trick or two about light."

Hyperthermia stared.

"I'm screwing with your eyes. On your way." The Lord said. Hyperthermia scampered off again. The Lord wondered if the girl wouldn't be back later, trying to probe the exact same issue.

"Behind all their personal vanity, women themselves always have an impersonal contempt for woman." The Lord said, and returned to work.

* * *

The dust that was blown into Marissa's face would have probably hurt a lot, if she hadn't been wearing a protective facial covering. That, by itself, was dismissible.

What was not was that there was no wind. Someone had thrown the dust in her face.

Switching her face-plate to scanning mode, Marissa's held an arm out as an electrified blade sprang from her gauntlet. Marissa took a few seconds to adjust the voltage before she began to look around, trying to find her attacker. At first, she thought one of the Genocide members was trying to amuse themselves. She quickly dismissed that after a quick sweep: none of them were experienced enough in their powers to hide from her technology. But without them…

She was alone.

"_Not alone…"_

"_One of us…"_

"_So much like us…"_

Marissa felt the dryness start to grow in her mouth, her eyes continuing to scan around. She'd been on the fence for some time, but now she was certain the voices were not in her head. They didn't match. Which meant it was an outside force, and one her technology couldn't recognize. And that made her nervous, no matter what the situation.

What was it? Some sort of residual effect of the magic the Lord was tapping, or manipulating to get what he wanted? Was it affecting her, or the island? Or…

The voice that howled in her ear was nowhere near a whisper. It was a full-on shriek.

* * *

"So, at this point, you abandoned the location and returned here to report to me." The Lord said, a large block of black crystal in front of him. As he finished speaking, he pointed at it, and a segment of it broke off and drifted to another table of stone.

"Yes sir." Marissa said quietly. She did not tell the Lord how she had screamed, and kept screaming for at least a third of her flight. And how she'd stopped said flight by hiding behind a rock and scanning around with her personal sidearm for six minutes before she'd finally moved again. Or the sick disgust and weakness she'd felt afterward for reacting that way. She hoped and prayed the Lord wouldn't pry. If he saw her weakness…

"Right then. Based on your observations, what do you think is happening?"

Marissa was silent.

"Miss Mori?" The Lord said, turning his head slightly.

"…well…sir…you talked about the terrible things humanity did here…could it be possible that whatever power you're accessing is reinforcing an…imprint of sorts? Causing an echo?"

"You mean spirits of the dead, I assume."

"I…really don't know sir. All I know is my equipment is not reading it correctly."

"And do you think _you _are reading it correctly, Miss Mori?" The Lord said, a dark glint in his eye.

"…yes." Marissa said quietly.

"Very well then. Do you not want to return to those areas? Or, should I go out and see what is going on myself?" The Lord said, resuming his work on the crystal.

"I'm worried that whatever it is, sir, could interfere with your plans."

"If it could, you wouldn't have to report it to me." The Lord said. "All the same, I'll do my own investigating. Scout out another location, Miss Mori. Or crunch whatever data you have. I'd rather not eat into our buffer any more than we have to."

"…yes sir." Marissa said, and hurried off. She'd wasted enough of his time. The operation was on a critical time frame, and she couldn't jeopardize it any further. Especially not if it was her fault.

The master had worked hard to make her well. She could not ruin his work.

The Lord did not watch her go, making a few more gestures as he adjusted the crystal. He stopped to look at it, one hand on his chin.

"…Convictions are more dangerous foes of truth than lies." The Lord mused.

His hand abruptly snapped out, black arcs of power surging into the shadows and yanking Carcinogen into the Lord's grip. The Jamaican's wide eyes stood in stark contrast to his dark skin, but strangely, he did not speak. Possibly because the Lord was sealing his mouth shut.

"I can hear your ignorant thoughts, Tremaine. All the time, and ESPECIALLY when you think you're spying." The Lord said. "I dislike the assumptions you make based on your own experiences. Just because you were property doesn't mean all property is created equal. My reasons are my own, and I will only tolerate questioning of them to a degree. I allowed you and your fellows free will and independent thought, but it becomes clear that you still require a few adjustments."

The Lord raised his other hand, his finger elongating out into a claw.

"The unfortunate part is, this will hurt. The fortunate part? You won't remember the pain."

Carcinogen made no sound, but the Lord heard his screams echoing in his mind.

He tried not to enjoy them too much. He had work to do.

* * *

Marissa didn't know if the whispering had decided to stay away or if it was just biding it's time. She had hoped it was gone for good.

Except, deep down, she had known it would return. The contrast between what she want and what she knew had made her sick, her stomach constantly clenching in nausea and her hands shaking when she tried to do fine tasks. Marissa forced her appendage to stop its nervous thrumming each time, and every time she had to do so, she wondered what was worse. The anticipation, or what it would mean if it came.

When it came.

It did, when she was seeing the last of her mechanisms into one of the caves she'd selected for its concealment.

"_You think you're different from us?!"_

Marissa jerked up, her taser-sword extending and hunting for a target.

The abrupt ice-cold wind chilled her to the bone, a long howl sounding beneath the gale. Marissa kept searching around, looking for a target, but her systems couldn't find anything.

"_We taught all who came before!"_

"_You are no different!"_

"_You belong with us! Scream with us!"_

Marissa swallowed, lowering her weapon and trying to control her body as it trembled. She couldn't let this affect her, whatever it was. The master's plan was more important. She could ignore words, even loud words inside her head, even wind, as long as she focused on the plan.

All she had to do, was focus on the plan. She sealed the cave up.

Which was when the face appeared in her vision.

Marissa's shriek was swallowed up by the face's own, the young girl staggering back and falling onto her rear. More faces appeared, distorted distortions lacking any semblance of sense, all laughing, crying, screaming at her.

Before vanishing without a trace.

Said trace quickly returned, as black cracks erupted across the ground in front of Marissa, and before her horrified eyes turned into a word.

**DIE.**

"_EAT YOU ALL UP!"_

"_NO HELP!"_

"_NO HIDING!"_

"_WILL BE PART OF US ALL!"_

The next thing Marissa remembered was falling to her knees. Considering she didn't remember getting up, that was saying something. She started at the dark ground beneath her hands, before the pain in her legs reached her. Panting and gasping in air, she looked up at where she was: it was some distance from where the presence had threatened her.

Marissa spent some time sitting where she had fallen, looking back the way she had come. Raw, sick fear surged through her the entire time, and it wasn't just in regards to the strange, hostile presence.

She still had work to do, and the tormenting, angry voices weren't going to go away. But she couldn't go back to the master. He had too many problems already. She couldn't add her troubles to his.

He had no sympathy or pity for weakness. He'd have none for her. Marissa felt a small sob escape her throat as she stared at the ground, her eyes hot and aching. She didn't want to go back. She didn't want to leave.

…she could not let down the Lord. If he had been where she was, he'd fight through what would oppose him. Like he always did.

She had to do the same. She had to pull herself together, and face this.

"…It wants you to break." Marissa whispered to herself. "That's the only reason it would do this. Don't do it. Won't do it. He wouldn't. I won't. I…won't."

Eventually, Marissa found she could stand again.

The voices did not take long to return. Steeling her thoughts as best she could, she forced herself forward.

* * *

The Lord would have admitted it if asked: he was somewhat impressed of the way Aguardiente appeared before him. Of all the new members of Genocide currently active, Brody Whelan seemed to have taken to his new state the best. Considering how much time he'd spent in prison, it wasn't that surprising.

"Yes?" The Lord said, his hands out as he gestured every now and then, moving gigantic pieces in the distance.

"Something's wrong master." Aguardiente said, hesitating just a bit before the last word.

"If you wish you can just call me Lord. Using it as my name, not as a title." The Lord said. "I cannot believe in a God who wants to be praised all the time."

"…I'm sorry."

"You have no need to be sorry yet. You chafe under unjust hands. There is a small role you can play in avoiding that. What is it?"

"Something's wrong. I was off on the beach, and the waves started speaking."

"Speaking?"

"As in, talking. Yelling." Aguardiente said. "At first I thought it was some training trick, but it wouldn't stop, no matter what I did. I don't think it's an intruder either. It's…weird. I thought I should tell you."

"Hmmmmmm." The Lord mused. "It would seem unlikely that something like that could escape my notice. However, this is a large project, and my attention is stretched thin. Go somewhere else, and report back to me if the same thing occurs. I'll go investigate the beach later."

"Yes Lord." Aguardiente said, turning around, his blue cloaks shifting around him.

"Have you changed your mind about the sc-…"

"No." Aguardiente said, leaving. The Lord, despite himself, chuckled.

"It says nothing against the ripeness of a spirit that it has a few worms." The Lord said. In the distance, a hundred story tower rose.

* * *

Perhaps the Lord should have investigated Aguardiente's claims. Perhaps Genocide shouldn't have been so put-off by the behavior of their so-called superior. Perhaps Marissa Mori should have made a decision under less duress.

Free will and choice so often seemed strange bedfellows.

The screams and faces, the wind and chill, Marissa had found she could endure all that, as she forced her way through her tasks. It was when familiar faces began to appear among the snarling ghosts that Marissa had finally faltered once more.

They were faces she barely remembered, and had not thought of for a long time. Faces whose barely-hidden scorn and disgust had driven her down this path. Faces she had transformed into agonized expressions of terror and pain. Or rather, _she _hadn't. That was what the master had taught her.

Yet here they were, former classmates and teachers, yelling and screaming at her. Several times, they actually seemed to take physical form and lunge at her. The first time, she'd managed to duck. The second time, she hadn't made it in time. It had gone right through her, giving her a sense of biliousness that made her earlier pain seem like mild heartburn.

Many times, she wanted to break and run, and not come back.

Every time, she came back to the same conclusion, and pressed on.

The visions did not lessen. If anything, they grew worse. It seemed like hours since the whispering, snarling, and cursing in her ear had started without an end. She had seen black cats sitting on her machines, detaching and pawing their heads around, and speaking in low tones calling her the queen of lying. She'd seen corpses that reached to touch her and then disappeared when she blinked. Twice, she'd seen floating guns in the corner of her vision, pressed against her temple, only for them to vanish as well, whenever she turned to face them directly.

She'd lost all sense of time. She'd run out of tears.

But she knew where she was. Her last location, buried within a cave near the sea shore. The never-entered abyss reeked of stagnant sea water, Marissa having walked through several brackish pools of it to reach a suitable case for her beacon.

The numbers and letters on her equipment were gone, replaced with BURN IN HELL and YOU DESERVED IT. Marissa typed her commands from memory. Instead of a signal tone indicating she'd properly entered the data, the machine laughed at her. She sensed, and felt, endless presences around her, all of their voices blurring together and speaking in the same voice…

The gun was back. She heard it click.

"…if you were going to kill me, I think you would have done it by now." Marissa said. "Even if you had to gain strength from being alone for so long. In which case, you want me to do the work. I will not."

Marissa stood up, reaching up to push the gun away. Her hand made it fade into the ether it had come from. Her chest hurt, and her knees wobbled as she looked around, but she remained where she was, the myriad of twisting shapes thrashing around her.

"I have something to do. To live for. I have no place among you. Good bye."

The cave went dead silent.

For a moment, Marissa considered running. Then she decided that might undermine what she had said and prompt retaliation, and so turned to walk.

In truth, what happened next would have happened no matter what she did.

The force slammed into the small of her back. Marissa managed to activate her personal shield before she was hammered into the wall with bone-shattering force. Another button activated her emergency beacon, and the third one caused her crackling electrical blade to extend from her personal gauntlet, as she tried to twist from the grip of the forces that held even as she futilely tried to attack it.

They were screaming again. So many screams. She had drawn them all in time, as the supposed weakest link. Her defiance had prompted their rage to explode, and in the way of things outside the world, said rage would have fatal consequences. Marissa swiped a few more times before she was slammed down against the cave floor and dragged across it. She felt a clawing hand seize her face plate and rip it off like it was made of cheap plastic.

"_DIEWORTHLESSWHORE!"_

The cold foulness of the sea water engulfed Marissa's head as the forces plunged her into one of the standing water puddles. Raw panic sent adrenaline exploding through Marissa, as she fought with the fury of a cornered animal to get free.

Before her electrical gauntlet, also by tearing hands, was violently forced into the water as well. The rehabilitating current blasted through Marissa, a vicious rending buzz that slammed a thousand needles of heat into her muscles. Her armor's systems unable to stop the voltage for a few seconds, and a few seconds was all that was needed to undermine Marissa's efforts to free herself, a paralyzing weight settling onto her efforts to be free.

They did not stop. The will of an animal to live was strong.

But as strong as that was, centuries of festering hatred from thousands of trapped souls was stronger.

The worst part was, she knew the water was shallow. She could FEEL the air she needed above her with her grasping, pushing arms, but the vehemence kept her head under water, inches from freedom that she couldn't cross. She kept fighting, each second passing like an hour, a burning vice beginning to close on her chest. She felt her right wrist break as the screaming rage bore down on her, forcing her head into the water even more. She felt water filling up her throat…

The stronger hand seized her and yanked her free. Marissa found her lungs clear a second later, dark power yanking the water out. Her mind was too addled to hear the cacophony of screams somehow increase in timber even more. All she recognized was the black shape holding her.

The Lord's words slid across her mind like a brand.

"Regret? You have not _**BEGUN**_ to feel regret."

Darkness claimed Marissa Mori again. This time though, she went with relieved comfort.

* * *

"_**Miss Mori?"**_

Marissa was aware she was starting to leave a dreamless sleep, and that a voice had spoken as she had begun to awake.

"_**Listen carefully. You are in an isolation tank, back in Ginnungagap. I placed you there to recover after your encounter. That is the water you feel. Do not panic."**_

Despite the Lord's words, Marissa felt fear crawl through her veins anyway. She was becoming aware of the warm water she was laying in, a breathing mask on her face. The isolation tank was pitch dark, but at least it was large and not confining, as Marissa's quickened movements could not find the sides or the roof.

"_**Do you want light?"**_

Marissa nodded. A moment later, she realized that this likely could not be seen. A moment after that, she was proven wrong, as several dim lights turned on inside the isolation tank.

"_**There's a button to your side that will open the tank. Join us when you are ready, but do not take TOO long, if you would."**_

Marissa didn't. She wanted out of the water, and quickly. The button opened the top as promised, and Marissa climbed out to find herself in one of the rooms in the Lord's main base, buried deep in the Antarctic. The Ginnungagap, as he'd recently named it. Apparently it had something to do with Norse myth.

Marissa looked down at herself, noting she was still dressed in the outfit she'd had on _Voix_, though the combat armor and boots had been removed. She wasn't sure what to make of that fact, as she looked around and tried to assess exactly where in the base she was.

"_**There is a list of tasks for you to do before you leave. Get to them when you will, but do not take TOO long. When you are ready to leave, indicate you are by crossing an X on the marked spot on the parchment."**_

Said parchment was on the wall by the exit door. Marissa took it and looked it over: it asked for a few simple tasks that would not be difficult or long. It also told her she was near her room, which Marissa gladly headed for to change her damaged uniform.

At least, that was the plan. Instead, Marissa found herself sitting on her bed, staring at the wall. She did this for an indeterminate length of time, her thoughts jumbled and sorrowful.

It ended with the small black cat jumped up onto her bed and mewed, wanting attention. Marissa petted the cat for a bit, finding the process helped calm her somewhat. Getting dressed, Marissa began attending to the tasks she'd been given. All the while, as she checked the base's security, made sure the 'special guests' were comfortable (she didn't see much of said guests recently: she had no idea if that was intentional or not), and made sure the actual guests were fed and content, the small black cat followed at her heels.

It was sitting at a table while she considered if she wanted to eat something that she finally worked up the courage to what had consumed her thinking process the whole time.

"Sir?"

There was no reply. Marissa waited. After several minutes, the voice spoke in her mind.

"_**I answer, Miss Mori."**_

"What happened?"

"_**I brought you back here after the incident. Do not worry about your assigned tasks. You completed them to the needed degree, enough that I could finish the job."**_

Marissa was silent, staring at the table.

"_**I sense your regret, Miss Mori. If you're going to feel bad because you did not personally complete your assignment, I am to blame. I did not take your report as seriously as I should have. You were right. There WAS a vindictive force on the island. Those who died here had a more literal presence then I expected."**_

"…that still doesn't answer…what happened…"

"_**You were assaulted, Miss Mori. By legions of angry spirits. My tasks and the energies I was manipulating managed to obscure them enough to keep them away from my immediate attention. I didn't realize they were there until it was almost too late. I…do apologize for that."**_

Marissa didn't reply again. Mewing, the black cat jumped into her lap, and she petted it for a bit.

"_**In any case, I have properly dealt with those spirits. They have been punished for their crime. Virtually everything else is completed. We are eighteen hours, give or take, before final initiations. When you are ready to return, you know the method. Make sure you eat before you come here. You likely won't get the chance to for some time."**_

Marissa nodded, spending some time making herself a meal and eating it, the small black cat sitting on the table and watching her as she did so. Putting the dishes away, she checked over the list of tasks once more, and then did a once-over of the tasks she had already completed. With that done, she crossed off the mark on the paper, watching the words disappear and be replaced with a new, singular instruction: to go to a certain room. Checking her person to make sure she hadn't forgotten anything, she headed towards it, the black cat trailing after her.

She felt her hair beginning to stand on end as she entered the designated room. The walls, floor, and roof were covered with sigils and runes, and the center of the room was taken up by a white metal structure of incomprehensible design. From various parts of the structure, black crystals jutted, swirling dark energies within them. Marissa walked up to it, looking at the setup with relative disinterest. She'd been in here before.

The scent of burning ozone filled her nose, and Marissa briefly had an intense sense of vertigo as the ripping noise echoed across the room. She turned around to see the portal, an ebony hole in thin air, strange colors dancing beyond.

"_**Wait one moment, Miss Mori. I am sending something through."**_

The black cat, still at Marissa's side, mewed, its fur comically frizzed up. Marissa knelt down and smoothed it out as best she could, feeling the cat purr beneath her hand.

The portal pulsed, and something emerged from the air and drifted towards Marissa. She reached out and took it, regarding the dark crystal in her hand, nearly identical to the ones on the edifice behind her. It hummed in her grip, cool to the touch.

"_**Another Shard. I decided to add it to the stockpile rather than try and find a new bolthole to hide it in. Insert it and then enter the portal. It will take you to the island."**_

Marissa did what she was told, finding an empty socket on the metal edifice and placing the crystal carefully into it. It would not break if she dropped it, but that did not keep her from using a delicate touch.

"_**That is all, Miss Mori. Your transportation awaits."**_

The cat mewed, rubbing up against Marissa's legs as she started towards the gateway. She reached down and petted him a bit more before she left. The cat watched her go, as Marissa stepped through the portal and vanished. The rift sealed itself after she was through, leaving the cat in the room.

Left alone, the cat washed itself a bit before sitting down and watching the door. Nothing would get at the structure behind it. It was on the job.

* * *

Falling.

Every time she did this, Marissa felt like she was falling. Blind, deaf, and hurling downward towards an unknown point of landing. The first she'd experienced it, she'd ended up bed-ridden for two days from the shock of re-entering proper reality. Now, she barely noticed.

Clarification came flooding back to her a moment before her feet set down on the rock. She blinked away the darkness, staring out at the ocean waves before her. She'd been brought back on a cliff.

"Over here, Miss Mori."

Marissa turned around.

The citadel before her filled her vision, seemingly dwarfing the mountain it had been carved into. It partly reminded Marissa of a grasping hand, with the other aspect that of blades, all black stone and crystal interlaced and extended away from each other, both artfully constructed and deformed at the same time, a looming vision of death. She'd seen it being constructed, but missing the final moments of its creation made it impressive all over again.

Genocide did not seem as impressed, as they stood or sat around where the Lord was, on top of a rock outcropping. The tower before him crackled and surged with dark energies, a whirlpool of black clouds swirling around the sky above it. Any observer familiar with fiction probably would have found it comical, if the air wasn't filled with a sense of oppressive dread.

"Some of our finest work, is it not, Miss Mori?" The Lord said.

Hyperthermia, being in a position to actually look at Marissa, could tell. She wasn't brilliant, like her new master, but she could read faces well enough. Marissa didn't like the structure. In fact, she seemed outright bothered by it.

"Yes sir." Marissa said. Hyperthermia cocked her head, realizing that the master's right hand was lying through her teeth…

And, when she glanced at the Lord, seeing the ghost of a smirk cross his face, she realized he knew it too. She felt deeply bothered by the whole thing, and turned back to look at the fortress slash weapon she'd had a minor hand in making.

"Etemenanki." The Lord said, 'cupping' the structure in his hand. "The Sumerian ziggurat that was said to inspire the Tower of Babel. Do you read the bible, Genocide?"

"Not any more. It's all bullshit." Aguardiente said. Carcinogen just grunted, while Hyperthermia shook her head.

"Mankind grew proud, and tried to build a tower that would reach God. God grew angry in turn, and shattered the tower, casting men down and cursing them with many languages, so that they could never unite in such a way again." The Lord said. "I do not have to reach God. I will simply burn what he made and replace it with something better."

"So…sir? What IS the plan?" Hyperthermia said.

"Some time ago, I was given a gift. This book." The Lord said, producing a tome from within his shadowy cloaks. "The Zelmotta Arcana, a vade mecum of magical knowledge and spells. Within its pages, I learned of something beyond our reality. There are many forms of existence, some lying in juxtaposition beside each other by razor thin margins. Dimensions of chaos, of paradise, of void…and power. I knew this already, of course, but the Arcana allowed me to learn of a specific one. The _Aeternus Locus_. Roughly translated, the Foreverwhere."

"So…we've built this thing to access it?" Carcinogen asked.

"Oh no Tremaine. Accessing it is another matter." The Lord said. "That was actually the part that occupied my primary efforts. You see, there are times when the barriers between such dimensions as ours and the _Locus_ thins, and it is possible for one to cross between them. Normally, one must take heed at this. Terrible creatures and energies can bleed through the rift, and likewise, what we know as reality could poison what another plane deems as its norm. That is not a concern here. The Foreverwhere is one thing, and one thing only. Power. Raw, unlimited _power._ Some have said when universes are being made, and are to be touched with the spark of magic, the Foreverwhere is where the spark comes from."

"…so…it's thinning here?"

"Ah Tremaine. No." The Lord said. "The magicians of this world are not fools. They know when the stars will line up, and where the soft spots between our realms will occur. They will be, and are, watching those areas. Making sure no one attempts to open anything there. But magic is not a mindset that allows change easily. The magicians of this world, as powerful as they may be, are hampered by outmoded thinking. I am not going to take advantage of the universe's axis to enter a softened spot. I have instead placed myself, and this building, down on a nexus of ley lines, the veins of mystical power laid over this world that all magicians draw their energies from. A nexus that the magicians will likely not notice or pay attention to, with their need to watch established weak points in the world. I don't need a weak point. I'm going to make a brand new door."

"…so why did you build this then?"

"I have my reasons." The Lord said. "The primary need was making the hole. To do that, I needed ground soaked in blood and misery, in the darkest traits of man. Using that, I was going to make the hole. I wondered if it was enough…until I discovered I was so focused on that issue, I almost missed the legions of tormented spirits bound to the island of Poveglia."

"Is that what's screaming in the basement?" Aguardiente said.

"Yes." The Lord said plainly. "Do not go down there. Any of you. You likely will not survive the experience."

Marissa stared at the Lord, and had to fight back the sensation that she was going to pass out. The master had…taken the spirits and…done…WHAT? In the basement? Was he using…?

She didn't want to know. If she was the type, she would have prayed not to.

"With that said, everything is in position." The Lord said, turning around. "Soon, I will initiate the final part of the plan. And with that, I will remake the world. You will all stand witness. And if anyone tries to stop me…you will stand against them."

"Now you're talking my language." Carcinogen said, cracking his neck.

"Sir…_is _anyone coming?" Hyperthermia asked.

"In theory, no. But theory is just that." The Lord said. "Should it be proven wrong…then I am ready. More ready than anything anyone could bring to bear against me. Do try and keep me from being proven wrong, Genocide. Faith should be rewarded."

The Lord turned around, his cloaks of darkness flapping around him.

"After all, as Sun Tzu said, invincibility lies in the defense."

"And the possibility of victory in the attack." Aguardiente said. Marissa saw a brief flash of irritation cross the Lord's features.

"Very good, Mr. Whelan. Let's try and make that possibility as small as possible, shall we? Many a man fails as a good thinker because his memory is too good." The Lord said. "Miss Mori, there's a platform over there to take you to Etemenanki. Once you're inside, run one final diagnostic on all your equipment. Also give a final examination to the shy one. I believe he's fully prepared, but I missed some things already."

"Yes sir." Marissa said, as she headed for the platform.

"The rest of you, you can get to Etemenanki under your own steam. Eat and get some sleep. In fact, ingest the pharmacons I've provided you, it will ensure you get sleep, and deal with other issues of the body I don't want bothering you at this point in time."

"The what now?" Hyperthermia said. The Lord sighed.

"The medicine, Kyleona. The pills."

"Oh." Hyperthermia said. "…so that's it? Go snack and nap while you do the rest?"

"Yes."

"And that's all of the plan we need to know?" Carcinogen asked.

"Yes." The Lord said. "If I needed you to know more, I would have said so. I take my plans very seriously."

"Of course, sir." Carcinogen said, crossing his arms.

"You don't like not knowing all the details. That is intentional. Loose lips sink ships, as an old saying goes." The Lord said. "If you really want to know more, well, in terms of plans, I plan to live forever."

The Lord turned back to Etemenanki, the fortress seething with unnatural energies.

"So far, that's gone well."

* * *

No sun rose on the island. The suffocating mass of black clouds above the island kept it far away.

Dressed once more for combat, Marissa sat in the chair in front of her nerve center. The readings were the same as they had been for the past four hours. Nearby, Carcinogen slouched in a corner, smoking a cigarette. Hyperthermia and Aguardiente were elsewhere, likely outside.

Possibly to get away from the noise.

The chant filled the hallways, a low dissonancy that bothered the fledgling members of Genocide. Marissa, on the other hand, was used to the ancient, foreboding languages the Lord used to cast spells. What bothered her was the faintest of undertones beyond the chant, the sound of agonized screaming. Marissa didn't look further into the possibility. She already didn't want to know what was in the lowest levels.

The air hummed with discord, and Marissa felt the water bottle vibrating slightly in her hand as she picked it up. She drank and checked the readings once more.

This time, she did a double take. Scanning in to make sure she wasn't in error, she stared at what lay on her screen.

A moment later, she yanked a device out of the computer cluster and spun out of her chair. Carcinogen watched with dull interest as she ran from the room. Marissa sprinted through several hallways and then, in a rather strange change of motion, jumped into a pit.

Her fall slowed down gradually as she entered the room, and she landed as light as a feather behind the Lord. The power in the room bored into her, rattling her bones and humming in her teeth. The Lord's cloaks seemed larger than ever, filling her sight with a ragged wall of shifting black.

Which moved aside as the Lord turned around, one arm still behind him. Marissa briefly glanced at what lay beyond the Lord and found the process hurt her eyes. She promptly placed her full focus on her master, and did her best not to deviate.

"What is it, Miss Mori?" The Lord said, his tone neutral.

"Something's coming. Under the water."

"Something?"

"I can't get specifics. My scanners almost missed it entirely." Marissa said. "…I think it's a team. Maybe-"

The Lord cut Marissa off with a gesture. Dark sparks of energy danced in his eyes.

"Nothing can ever be simple, can it Miss Mori?" The Lord said.

The cloaks began to contort down onto the Lord, aspects of it merging and firming into metal armor on his chest, arms, and legs. More of the shadows flowed up into a upward crown of blades, his free hand becoming a metallic clawed glove in turn.

"Then again…we went to so much effort to prepare all these defenses." The Lord said. "It would be something of a shame if they were to go to waste."

Marissa nodded, as the Lord examined his clawed hand briefly, his other one still aimed behind him.

"Return to your station. Get Genocide to theirs. Await my order. If you need one, and I do not speak, then I trust your decision-making ability."

"Yes sir." Marissa said, turning and fleeing into the darkness off the room. The Lord watched her go, and then turned his attention back to his clawed hand. Dark mist and sparking energies surged up between his fingers.

"The man who is to be great is the one who can be the most solitary, the most deviant, the man beyond good and evil, lord of his virtues, a man lavishly endowed with will--this is precisely what greatness is to be called: it is able to be as much as totality as something multi-faceted, as wide as it is full." The Lord said. "If anyone wants to stand between me and what is mine, they better damn well be ready to face that fact."

The energies scattered as the Lord closed his hand violently. Around him, dark ripples and echoes sparked in unseen mechanisms.

"Come, my guests. I extend the same invitation to you." The Lord said. _**"CARPE NOCTEM."**_


	3. Gunboat

Chapter 3: Gunboat

"Whoever is first in the field and awaits the coming of the enemy will be fresh for the fight. Whoever is second in the field and has to hasten to battle will arrive exhausted."

-_Sun Tzu_

_**Some stories are forgotten. Some stories should never be told. Some never will be.**_

_Everything had been going according to plan._

_Those two Titans had beaten him, hell, they had almost killed him. He was exceptional, but so was a finely cut diamond, and you could break that by stepping on it. Part of him loathed them for how close they__'__d come to taking him out. The other part, the quieter one that would not gain dominance until later, almost admired them for how easy it was for them to abandon their ideals and give into the need to inflict violence and pain. It was a sign of the way things were, and always would be. Until he changed it._

_However, they had not killed him. And he was not so stupid to have not considered such a possibility. Hell, he__'__d been so arrogant (though that would more likely be an outside assessment rather than his own) that he had used pig__'__s blood to cover his tracks, certain the children who called themselves heroes would not feel the need to test it. With that done, he__'__d retreated into the sewers, carefully making his way back to the docks where he__'__d earlier selected a warehouse as a fall-back point._

_The Titans had swallowed his ruse. He was hurt, but still far better than any human specimen. The company who actually owned the building had no idea he__'__d infiltrated said warehouse._

_But Operation Market Garden had reared its ugly head again. Using the warehouse he__'__d selected was a relative idiot-proof idea._

_Unfortunately, an idiot had realized that too._

"_Foolish insect! You DARE invade the sangria sanctorum of Dr. Light?!__"__ Dr. Light thundered. Crouched where he was behind the boxes that provided him cover, The Lord could tell that the not-so-good doctor (in all aspects) was facing the wrong way, and hence yelling his declaration at a wall. He also had to bite back the impulse to yell at the so-called doctor who had in-avertedly stolen his __'__recovery base__'__ that he meant to say __'__sanctum sanctorum__'__. _

_Instead, he pulled his mechanical eye from his head, having to struggle a bit from the damage he__'__d suffered in his previous fight. Goddamn Titans. If the Lord had been fresh, he would have scouted out the warehouse beforehand, detected Light, and slit his throat before the hardly-a-doctor knew anyone was there. But the Lord was not fresh, and the pain and fatigue had made him walk into the warehouse to find Light had heard __**him **__coming instead. The first blast had nearly blown the Lord out of his boots. The second laser-style attack had cost the Lord a few mechanical fingers before he__'__d tossed a smoke-bomb and dove for cover._

_The Lord didn__'__t like losing. He disliked having lost already this night even more. The fact, on top of those, he was being smacked around by an idiot like Arthur Light was what drove him to his choice of action after he placed his eye on the box above him. It quickly pinpointed Light__'__s position, and the Lord struck. If he__'__d been fresh, he__'__d have shot Light._

_Instead, he jumped over the boxes and tried to gut him._

_The shield Light threw over himself knocked the Lord backwards through more boxes. Trying to recover, he roll-leapt to his feet and fired his claws across the room. The blades also bounced off the shield, Light laughing all the while before sweeping his hand in an arc. The light explosions almost knocked the Lord into the ceiling, and he crashed back down to the ground without a hint of grace, his body smoking and his badly damaged arm emitting sparks._

"_You should have paid attention, rabble! This city belongs to Dr. Light! You are NOTHING, before the brightest of them all!__"_

"_When I__…"__ Was all the Lord got out._

_Light__'__s twin-handed blast caused the entire front of the warehouse to explode, a small dark form tumbling like a rag doll before falling into the black ocean waters._

"_Let it be the last lesson, oh__…__oh crap.__"__ Dr. Light said, as the warehouse began to collapse around him. __"__I think I overdid it. Run away!__"_

_Light fled the disintegrating building, and the incidents of that night swiftly passed from his mind._

_The same could not be said of the Lord, as a barely-working mechanical hand ripped itself from the water and seized onto the wooden pole of one of the dock structures. If his rage had been transferred into heat, the whole harbor bay would have boiled._

_He would not accept this. Not any of what had befallen him._

_He would find a way to grow stronger._

_He would show them a brand new reason to fear the dark._

_The night._

_**And so I did.**_

_**No one will ever know the exact whys, though. The Titans probably think it was all them.**_

_**Fools. Much like Light. When things changed, I paid him a visit. Such interesting things I found in his head, though I only realized it in retrospect. I sometimes wonder if my revenge on him started the slow breakdown of the sins of others. And all that came from that.**_

_**But that is the past. I have always sought the future.**_

_**So do my mortal enemies.**_

_**So be it.

* * *

**_

The T-Oceanus hit the rocky gravel beach and was fully secured in five seconds. The Titans were all out in three, and had hit the ground running in another three.

They had run for _two _seconds when the figure surged up from the ground in front of them, causing them to stop in their tracks.

"Hello." The shadowy figure of the Lord said. The Titans had all begun raising their weapons when he resumed talking. "I am afraid you picked the wrong island to land on. If you are by some chance some curious bystander, well…you should not be here. The waters are too rough. Which leads me to the conclusion that you have purposely landed here. I regret that this will cost you…"

"We got the damn answering machine." Cyborg said.

"He can just check the Caller ID later." Gauntlet said, and lashed out with a yellow energy fist. The Lord-shadow shattered under the blow, the dark fragments vanishing as they fell.

"Whoa." Gauntlet said, withdrawing the energies of his artifact as he flexed his finger. "I can feel the interaction of the Fang shard. It broke that fake like it was nothing."

"If only everything else goes down so easily." Beast Boy said.

"Not bloody likely." Savior said.

The shadows surged up again, forming another copy-Lord. Gauntlet was about to punch it again when it spoke.

"Titans…"

Gauntlet paused (he did not want to admit he froze). Robin narrowed his eyes. He would have been as concerned as his teammate, had it not been for something he'd detected in the Lord's tone.

"I knew if anyone would come to investigate this, it would be you. I thought I'd hidden away from all eyes. Perhaps yours have truly improved that much?" The shadow-Lord said. "I do hope you brought help. You will need it. Because once you set foot on this island, you entered a communications dead zone. No message gets in, and no message gets out. The same for your person. If you came on your own…then you're on your own. Ha. Ha ha. However you came…come. Victory is ever more joyous with the…"

Gauntlet's fist shattered the second Lord-shadow as easily as the first.

"So, who wants the next one?" Gauntlet said.

"We don't have time to play Whack-A-Lord. We have to go." Robin said, pointing in the distance. "The Lord's been busy."

The Titans had been too distracted by the D-Day style landing and the near-immediate appearance of the Lord's shadow to see it before. Once their eyes settled on the massive, terrible form of Etemenanki, seething with power on the distant mountain like a rotting sore, they wondered how they had missed it.

"Huh, I was expecting a skull." Gauntlet said.

"It does sort of look like a hand. If you stuck the hand in a blender and then…stuck…licorice in it or…something…" Beast Boy said, before the shadows flowed up again, forming into yet another Lord.

"Perhaps you…"

Cyborg shattered the Lord-construct with a golden solar blast before he got any further.

"He really seems to think that we've come to say hello or something." Cyborg said, turning around as a keypad appeared on his arm. "Okay. Fine."

The upper body of the T-Oceanus slid open, as a vehicle-length cannon emerged from its innards. Even as it appeared, golden light began to shine up its length. A few seconds after fully arming, it fired. The radiant blast flew over the Titans' heads and to the Lord's citadel in the distance.

"KNOCK KNOCK."

The blast hit the upper levels of the main structure and exploded, and Etemenanki shuddered as it began to collapse on itself. The Titans stared in shock.

"…did we just win without throwing a single punch?" Scalpel said.

The tumbling mass of Etemenanki froze.

"…damn it." Cyborg cursed.

"Oh this is some _Funny Games_ level shit." Gauntlet complained, as the destruction wrought by Cyborg's solar cannon began to reverse itself, the building reconstructing itself before the Titans' eyes.

"Personally, I'd go with _Christine_." Savior said.

"I'd go with _A Confederacy of Dunces_, because that's what the Lord clearly thinks we are." Cyborg said, and pressed another button. "You think I just brought one big gun?"

The sides of the T-Oceanus opened, multi-racked missile launchers sliding out.

"Little pig, little pig, let me come in, _motherfucker_."

The missiles launched in a storm of whining ignitions, streaking through the air and towards Etemenanki.

This time, the tower did not just stand there.

Raven saw crystal emplacements light up on its many twisted lengths, firing black blasts towards the projectiles as they rocketed in, blowing them apart before they came anywhere near their target. She ground her teeth lightly, feeling the sour taste of the emerged power in the back of her throat. Whatever the scenario, the Lord had not been asleep at the switch.

The shadows surged up in front of the Titans again, forming another crude echo of the Lord.

"So you have come to war. I say…"

The construct shattered as Robin scythed through it, his staff in one hand and his crimson sword in the other.

"NO MORE TALKING! LET'S GO!" Robin yelled, and the rest of the Titans resumed their charge.

Fourteen seconds later, they all stopped dead again.

"…well this can't be good." Morgue said, looking at the masses of black birds gathered on the rocky ground before them.

"Great. Hitchcock on the cheap, in funding AND metaphor." Gauntlet said, looking at all the avians before them. Not just any avians. Ravens.

"Raven?" Cyborg asked, his eyes scanning the animals.

"They're…birds. Just birds. I…" Raven said.

"_**Turn back."**_

Terra recoiled as all the ravens spoke in one voice, a dry, cool, mocking whisper. Raven felt the sourness in her mouth increase. Normal birds. Touched by his hand. And her past.

"_**Turn back."**_ The ravens all said again.

"This is one callback I could do without." Beast Boy said. A blade of Shimmer energy sprang from Savior's arm, though he stayed his hand.

"_**Turn back."**_ The ravens said, and then a dark mist began flowing from all of the birds, forming into another Lord-shadow above them.

"On anyone else, this will be lost. But I have my suspicions on just _who _will see it." The Lord-shadow said. "Show me."

The form scattered before the Titans could shoot it, and the ravens took to the air. They did not attack the Titans: they had been reduced to mere birds, and hence flew off and away.

The sour taste increased in Raven's mouth so much she almost gagged.

"They're coming."

Darkness erupted from the ground, as far as the eye could see. The blackness formed into legions of humanoid shapes, featureless creatures wielding every weapon under the sun. The Abhorred. The rank and file of the Lord's will. If the Titans had never seen them again, after the last time, it would have been too soon.

Robin took a slow, deep breath.

"…_**DROP 'EM**_."

* * *

"So, why did the ma-Lord, even bother with us if he was just going to send the bait out?" Carcinogen said.

"They're bait?" Hyperthermia replied.

"No no, bait. Means punk…oh why bother." Carcinogen said.

"I believe that was a bit of Jamaican slang." Aguardiente said.

"Ey right mah brodda, bad like yaz, When we a go a door, it be ah sey one." Carcinogen said, cranking his normally almost-gone accent all the way up. Hyperthermia stared in confusion, while Aguardiente's face was more unreadable, though his blue cloak over his features helped with that.

"Can't you just talk English?" Hyperthermia said.

"Hey girl, I could…" Carcinogen began in a cranked-up accent before Marissa walked in. "Girl-boss on the deck."

"What is it, Miss Mori?" Aguardiente said. "Are we being sent out yet?"

"No." Marissa replied quietly. She really would have preferred to do this via a remote, but the master's word was law.

"Might I ask why?"

"The Lord has planned a thorough defense. You likely will play a role in the immediate future."

"You sure, girl? The Lord just sent about a thousand and four shadow things to jump all over dem Titans. They might be dead before we can even get any blood under our nails." Carcinogen said, his accent slipping in and out.

"Ewwwwwwww." Hyperthermia said.

"I was speaking metaphorically girl, though I kinda like it myself."

"That's fine. Just remember your orders." Marissa said. "The master frowns on his hard work being used improperly."

"Considering I'm actually going to get my hands dirty in SOME form boss-lady, you should think I know this." Carcinogen said.

"Provided there's anything to do." Hyperthermia said.

The ground shook on the concealed balcony Genocide was standing on. Marissa was the only one who barely moved: the rest of Genocide lurched about, caught off guard by the assault against their balance.

"What was that?" Hyperthermia said.

"Earth tremor." Marissa replied.

A burst of furious light lit up the horizon. The echo of an explosion sounded in Genocide's ears, followed by another lurch in the ground.

"That, on the other hand, was an explosion shockwave." Marissa said. "The master knows what he's doing, Hyperthermia. The Titans have bothered him repeatedly; he's probably considered they could be a thorn in his side again. Trust him. Any other way of thinking…will not have good results."

* * *

As soon as Robin spoke, the rage came roaring back in Terra's ears, her vision staining red.

Rage. Tara Markov wasn't Raven, with all her meditation and introspection on the nature of emotions, but she knew a thing or two about their double-edged blade. Her primary lesson in her early days, after controlling her fear, was controlling her anger. If she hadn't learnt to do that, she'd risk terrible collateral damage should she lose her temper in mid-battle, or for whatever reason.

She had, and it hadn't been easy. A lot of superhero training wasn't easy, often going against the basic nature of people. More than once, Terra had just wanted to completely 'unleash the beast' and damn the consequences. Noel's semi-treachery had been the closest she'd ever come to giving in in a long time, only holding onto the standard the Titans had taught her by her fingernails. After that, she'd channeled her anger into her preparations.

She'd waited a good, long time to throw off the chains, and as Robin gave his order, the sheer psychotic desire that erupted into her, ordering her to destroy, almost shook her to the core. Almost.

Because she had the perfect way to release the rage. Before her lay the army of the creature that had hurt her, her friends, her family. Not even remotely human or alive. The Titans would not spend ten seconds on them. She would rip the earth open beneath them and devour them all.

And so she did.

And found the rage crushed beneath the pain.

The Lord was no fool. He knew what his enemies were capable of.

He also knew their mental blind spots.

Raven felt the backlash almost as keenly as Terra, as the geokinetic sank to her knees. She'd known what Terra was going to do almost as soon as Terra had. It had not been enough time to warn her.

"Terra!" Beast Boy said, sprinting to his girlfriend's side. Several Abhorred leapt at the pair, only to meet the same shattering end the Lord's shadow-echoes had as Gauntlet punched them all aside. Several more likewise zoomed in on Raven, only to be sliced to ribbons by several Shimmer shards. Raven snapped out the residual agonies she'd felt from Terra a second later.

"Terra?" Beast Boy asked.

"Hurts…tried to open the ground and it hurts…" Terra whispered.

"He's poisoned the island." Raven said, swiftly flying over to the pair. Now she knew why the sour taste in her mouth was so persistent. The Lord's power tainted every inch of the ground they stood on. "Probably so we can't just break it in half."

"I can't do anything?" Terra said.

"I didn't say that."

"No worries, Terra." Cyborg said, as he slammed his arms together, the limbs fusing and expanding into a massive gun. "WE GOT IT!"

The golden blast that flared out of Cyborg's arms mirrored the one that had fired from the T-Oceanus, as the Canis Majoris cannon tore through the ranks of the Abhorred like they weren't there, before exploding near their rear ranks and decimating the shadow creatures even further. Even as he fired, Starfire flew up and raked her eye beams across the front lines of the Abhorred, slicing a few dozen into pieces and burning the pieces away.

"Titans, advance! Semi-clustered thrust, don't let them get behind us!" Robin yelled, twirling his weapons up. An Abhorred swung his own blade at him, and Robin swung to block it. The fact his sword cut right through the Abhorred's own and through the creature itself almost caused him to become unbalanced. The Abhorred that tried to take advantage got a boot to the head, and much to Robin's surprise the entity was driven back by it.

The Fang shards _were _working. Fresh confidence swelled in Robin's chest.

"LET'S GO!"

"Music to my ears." Cyborg said. He meant it, as metallic 'buds' promptly sprouted from his shoulder and affixed themselves over his ears as he separated his arms. Burning-red solar blades sprung from his wrists, and Cyborg ignited his advanced-armor's boot-jets as he smashed into the Abhorred legions, slicing and cutting his way through even as Dragonforce blared on his iPod. It was cliché, but it fit so well.

--------

"Terra, fall back." Beast Boy said.

"But…"

"You're a liability like this. Fall back." Beast Boy said, and turned into a cobra. Terra stared for a moment, and understood.

"Leave some for me." Terra said, scrambling up and retreating.

--------

"Morgue, cover her!" Scalpel yelled as he slashed through several Abhorred with his glaive.

"The things I do under fire." Morgue said, before she raised her own personal solar weapon, the _Dyson's Fear,_ and fired three quick blasts that disintegrated the Abhorred that began to give chase.

--------

"Normally I'd make a joke." Gauntlet said, before lashing out with a gigantic Gauntlet sword that cleaved through the entire front rank of the Abhorred in front of him. "BUT EVERY SECOND I WASTE SPEAKING IS A SECOND I COULD BE SPENDING WASTING YOUR BOSS!"

Gauntlet slashed out the sword again…as the second rank of Abhorred jumped over it, their hands sprouting barbed claws as they dove at Gauntlet. "SHIT!"

Shimmer lines impaled through the leaping Abhorred, smashing them into the ground. Savior leapt over Gauntlet a second later, forming a morning-star like Shimmer weapon that smashed through more of the creatures. He glanced back at Gauntlet, and then went right back to work. Gauntlet had recognized the brief look as concern.

Gauntlet considered saying something, but decided against it. "Slay demons now, heart to hearts later." He then punched another Abhorred into disintegrating pieces.

--------

"Star, cut me a path." Beast Boy said, running along the ground as Starfire flew past him. She did not reply, instead thrusting out her arms and sending out a burst of Starbolts that blew another ragged hole in the Abhorred's ranks. With the room to build up further momentum given, Beast Boy sprinted a few more steps and then turned into a woolly rhinoceros. He put the extinct animal's bulk and twin horns to good use as he smashed his way through further Abhorred, timing their expected counterattack and turning into a platypus to dodge the retaliatory blades and mauls.

"Now for something completely different." Beast Boy said, turning himself into an anteater. The Abhorred lacked a mind to goggle at such a strange choice, before Beast Boy demonstrated why he'd picked it: it was small, hard to hit, and had a nasty set of claws.

And with the Fang shards implanted in him, the Abhorred's legs acted like they had Achilles tendons.

--------

The Abhorred Cyborg stomped on acted like it had a skull as well, its rough head shape crushed under his boot as he confronted several more. His blazing solar blades cut through their weapons even easier than Robin's had. After cutting down all the ones that were nearby, he swiftly transferred all power to one and lashed his arm out, the newly elongated blade cutting through all the Abhorred in front of him. His other arm converted to his classic sonic cannon: its blast wasn't as effective but it got the job done.

"I could do this all day." Cyborg said.

The bladed chain wrapped around his sonic cannon. Cyborg barely had a chance to react before another lashed around his neck, and two more around his knees. Cyborg slashed through the first chain, but that gave more Abhorred a chance to wrap three more chains around him. The dark energies hissed against his metal armor, and Cyborg grunted as all the Abhorred yanked on their chains, trying to pull the teen machine apart. Even as they did, more Abhorred leapt from above, weapons slashing down.

Green blasts blew them out of the sky. A moment later a slashing red sword carved through a few Abhorred and all of their chains.

"Thanks man." Cyborg said to Robin. "Coulda handled it but thanks."

"Turn up the pressure." Robin said.

"More?"

"HELL YES!" Robin said, throwing an explosive disc and running into the gap the blast provided him. Starfire floated down next to Cyborg. The Titan looked at his teammate, and with a fierce grin, turned both his arms into solar cannons. Starfire nodded, her eyes glowing, and she placed herself at Cyborg's back before the pair spun, a whirling dervish of explosive death.

--------

"Raven, I need a boost!" Scalpel said, popping up near the sorceress' side. Raven turned to look at the alien, and then nodded. Not needing a verbal confirmation himself, Scalpel charged forward.

Raven's dark energies surged up beneath him, throwing him into the air. Spinning around to avoid several dark arrows, Scalpel slid his glaive behind him, and pulled out his other primary weapon, held in two pieces in the back of his cape. Snapping the war hammer together, he fell back down among the Abhorred ranks like a bomb.

"GANG WAY!"

The impact not only shattered the ground for twenty square feet around Scalpel, it actually hurled a number of Abhorred around him up into the air. Whether that was due to his Fang shards, or because of Raven's power, Scalpel didn't know. He just took the time to switch his war-hammer for his glaive once more, and then turned his landing kneel into another leap, jumping up and twirling through the suspended entities. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw a solar blast shoot another Abhorred out of the air.

Morgue shot two more before she lowered her gun, looking around at the Abhorred that had surrounded her. Black bolts of retaliatory power from the entities flew through a cloud of bats, Sophie reforming after a second.

With one crucial difference: she was now holding a primed 'heliacal detonator'. In other words, a sun grenade.

"THIS…is my BOOM STICK!"

The grenade technically did not go boom, as it detonated in Morgue's hand by emitted a massive surge of solar light. What it did _did _stick though, as the Abhorred surrounding her were blasted away to nothing.

"…Maybe I should have said 'groovy' or 'hail to the king, baby' or something…This isn't a stick and it didn't go boom as I'd like or—Oh hell with it." Morgue said, holding out an arm. Dark ripples ran across her body and transformed into bats, the small creatures/avatars flying forward with special gifts for the closest Abhorred: their own heliacal detonators. Scalpel, having just landed, watched their light-explosions slice more holes in the Abhorred's masses.

"There we go, we're getting an edge. Speaking of edges…" Scalpel said, and whirled before hurling his glaive like a spear, the weapon tearing through yet more Abhorred.

--------

Raven looked around at it all, even as Savior did his best Asura impression and carved Abhorred apart with Shimmer weapons wielded on his two normal arms and four extra arms, while on another front Gauntlet charged forward, his yellow energy split in two and positioned perpendicular to his body. Every Abhorred the energy touched stuck to it like glue, even as Gauntlet located a rock shelf and ran towards it. He smashed the lines together, squashing the Abhorred in a vice, before he rammed it straight into the rock shelf. The stone protrusion was nearly broken in half from the impact, the Abhorred exploding into black mist as Gauntlet smashed the energy into the rock so hard he ended up with his metal-encased arm buried up to the elbow in it.

"I just rocked your world." Gauntlet said, his voice heavy with a faux-Australian accent. He waited a beat, and when no one told him his line was terrible he turned around. As it turned out, there had been no critique because the Titans were too busy beating the Lord's shadow army like they were red-headed stepchildren who owed them money.

"…so, does this seem too easy to you guys?" Gauntlet said. It took him a moment to realize, again, that none of the Titans could hear him over the massive racket. Gauntlet was about to raise his voice when he felt it.

Throughout the whole fight, Raven had held back, providing a little aid here and there. It didn't seem like the Titans needed her: even as the feeling flowed over Gauntlet, Beast Boy was tearing Abhorred apart as a velociraptor, and Scalpel had retrieved his thrown glaive and was slashing Abhorred apart with it as well. Robin was somehow topping Scalpel in the slice and dice race, his staff and sword sending Abhorred after Abhorred to the ground. One jumped into the air at him, only for Starfire to show up behind Robin and hurl HIM into the air. The Abhorred's large sword met Robin's boot, and Robin kicked right through the weapon and the Abhorred like he was striking a paper wall, spinning down and landing on his feet before tossing three Birdarangs in rapid succession, ripping even more holes through more shadow creatures.

All the while Raven floated up, darkness gathering around her cloaks, her eyes darkening into consuming ebony.

It was around then that Gauntlet suddenly had the worst feeling he'd ever had in his emotional life, a sickening cusp of 'possible venom' that was, in a way, worse than when he'd found out about what Noel had done that Halloween. Because watching Raven act, the dark, terrible possibility that suddenly leapt into his mind was that the rabbit hole went even deeper than any of them thought. That the real mole had been perfectly cloaked all along. That they were all more exposed than any situation that could be machinated on their home grounds.

"…oh crap oh crap CRAP." Gauntlet whispered.

"ZINTHOS." Raven whispered in turn.

The atramentaceous mist erupted from Raven's cloaks, an overwhelming surge of dark power that expanded across the entire war zone. It swept over the Titans and Abhorred alike. Gauntlet barely had time to throw a shield over himself before it closed over him.

It felt like the cold clench of death.

Then the Abhorred began to disintegrate.

Gauntlet's jaw fell open slightly, though his surprise wasn't at the fact the Lord's army was dying. The Titans had ripped their way through a few thousand of them, but there had still been a few thousand remaining. Then Raven had unleashed her offense, and within moments all that remained were breaking apart. The black fog lifted off the Titans, and Gauntlet dropped his shield, even as the other Titans drew back and took defensive poses, looking for any stragglers. There were none.

Gauntlet closed his mouth again, and felt his jaw crack as the muscles in it tensed. As said, his surprise was not at what Raven had done.

It was that he'd actually entertained the possibility that had entered his head. That she had been the real traitor, based entirely on the fact she'd been preparing her offensive instead of just running in and breaking stuff.

That what had happened had shaken his general sense of trust so bad.

…That the Lord had gotten into his thought process, even just a little. And Gauntlet knew that he might never get that painful snarl out again.

"Trust isn't as easy as you always said it was, numbnuts." Gauntlet said, speaking to himself as he lowered his hand, walking to rejoin the others.

"Aw, is that it? I was just working up a good sweat." Beast Boy was saying.

"I must admit…" Scalpel began.

"Don't." Raven said, floating over. "The Lord is not so one-dimensional."

"Speak for yourself." Robin said.

"Even if we did better than expected, I don't think he expected us to fall under at the first sign of trouble." Raven said.

"Which likely means the REAL trouble is coming." Starfire said, turning her eyes to the horizon.

* * *

If Marissa had been more familiar with history, the sight of the Titans going through the Abhorred like a hot knife through butter might have brought to mind the 1939 invasion of Poland by Nazi Germany. Poland's main offense had been with mounted horseback-based cavalry. The Germans used heavy armored vehicles and tanks, and crushed Poland in little more than a month.

Marissa, however, wouldn't have known if the Titans were the Germans or the Poland cavalry pulling one of the most lopsided victories in the history of warfare.

"…_**Miss Mori…"**_

Marissa heard the voice echo in her head. Despite its neutral tone, Marissa tensed up. The Lord's anger could be as unexpected as it could be terrible sometimes.

"Yes sir?"

"_**The Titans have learned well. Annoyingly well."**_

Marissa was silent, though her right hand was clenched into a fist so tightly she could feel her nails digging into the skin beneath her gloves.

"Then again, if they were any less, they'd already be dead." The Lord said. "The time has come, my dear Miss Mori, to talk of many things."

"Yes sir." Marissa said, as she began typing at her workstation, her observational screen vanishing beneath a myriad of others.

"Make the seas boil. And give them as much of a chance as pigs with wings."

* * *

"Should we advance?" Morgue asked.

"That might be what the Lord is expecting us to do. Cyborg, Raven, scan ahead."

"Give me a moment. Need to recharge from that last effort…" Raven said. Cyborg gave a thumbs up and went into his own scanning mode.

"…I am the Lord…" Savior said to himself, holding his chin. He did not notice the odd look that came over Gauntlet's eyes as he spoke. "I did not expect an attack…I prepared a defense based on possible need, not expected need…I am disdainful of most everything…yet I am not an idiot…I surely have a second line…would I be able to craft a second line on the fly in response to the response of the first line…if I could…what would I do…the enemy has neutralized my first line with greater speed and ease than likely expected…"

"Sneak attack?" Scalpel said, making Savior start. "Something we can't see coming?"

"Like…underground?" Savior said, looking down.

"Hey! Cyborg! Scan the ground too." Robin ordered.

"On it." Cyborg said, looking down. Robin gestured towards Starfire, and she flew up into the sky, scanning the horizon.

"…I'm not getting anything…but these readings are just weird in general. Raven. Didn't you say the Lord had poisoned the ground?" Cyborg said.

"Maybe he missed a spot?" Gauntlet said, poking the rock beneath him.

"It's not like that it's…" Raven said, before realization shifted across her eyes. "The ground. Cyborg, the odd readings you're getting, lock onto them, see if they're extending past the ground!"

"Past it? You mean like they're fueling something or…oh dear." Cyborg said. "RAVEN!"

Raven got the shield up over the group a second before the EMP went off. Even with her last-second protection, Cyborg felt a legion of burning nails scrape through his body, before his systems recovered and initiated repairs where it was needed.

"What was that?" Beast Boy asked.

"Electromagnetic pulse." Robin said. "Destroys electronics, circuits, items in that vein."

"Lordy mixed up his poison touch with the machine, helped cloak its coming." Cyborg said, twitching a touch. "Could have been bad."

"Star, move forward, check and make sure there isn't any more heading for us." Robin said. The alien proceeded to do so.

"Did anyone see where it was triggered?" Beast Boy asked. "That came out of nowhere."

"Now I don't feel so bad about cheating with anti-Lord magic." Gauntlet said.

"Don't be." Raven said. "The whole ground is rotten with his power. It's snarling my own efforts."

"It's also scrambling our communications." Robin said, having been looking at his communicator to see how it had handled the EMP. It still worked, but was mostly producing gibberish. "Anything you can do about that Raven?"

"Adapt." Raven said, talking about herself. "And hope it's fast."

"Good to know we have a specific plan." Gauntlet said.

"Star, there." Savior said, pointing at the ground. Starfire flew down and picked up a small, cooked robot. The process of unleashing the EMP had destroyed any features on it, leaving just a small black hunk of metal.

"This small thing? It explains how it snuck up on us." Starfire said. "We…"

Gauntlet's yellow energy hand managed to grab Starfire and yank her backwards a second before the red energy shots converged on her position, setting off a chain of explosions.

"Titans incoming!" Robin yelled, a little redundantly. The army had dropped its collective cloak as soon as it had fired on Starfire.

Replacing the Abhorred was a battalion of small, low to the ground robots, all orb-shaped and painted a dull grey-black to aid with camouflage. Most of them rolled along the ground in the manner of mini tanks: the rest also rolled, albeit in classic ball fashion.

It was several of the latter that reached the Titans first.

**DORMOUSE SABOTAGE INEFFECTIVE. INITIATING TWEEDLE OFFENSE.**

Savior didn't get a chance to smack the Tweedles out of the air: they exploded almost as soon as they were airborne. The pulse wave forced the Titans back despite Raven and Gauntlet's shields, shrapnel pelting the protective barrier in large amounts.

"Rolling bombs." Savior said.

"Mobile attack platforms." Cyborg said, indicating the other orb-shaped vehicle.

**CO-INITIATING MOCK-TANK OFFENSE.**

"WHERE DOES HE GET THE FUNDING FOR THIS STUFF!" Gauntlet yelled as numerous Mock-Tanks opened fire, red blasts of destructive energy flying from cannons that had emerged from their backs. Starfire and Cyborg counter-attacked, only to find while their shots took out a few Mock-Tanks, the rest were able to rapidly change direction and avoid the attack. The ones knocked over or sent tumbling quickly recovered: one that had lost its top-most cannon even proceeded to extract two smaller cannons from its sides and re-join the fray.

It almost kept the Titans from defending themselves when more Tweedles rolled around them and tried to blow up against their exposed backs. Raven lashed out with dark energy claws before they could, throwing the robots away before they erupted into their suicide explosions. A few pieces of flesh-piercing debris still streaked past the Titans, one of them glancing off Scalpel's protective measures in a manner that would have left an unpleasant leg wound otherwise.

"So what now Robin? Split up and risk being picked off, or stay together and risk being taken out in one fell swoop?" Savior said, slicing a nearby Mock-Tank in half. Much to his displeasure, he found the Mock-Tanks _also_ exploded, and hissed as hot pieces of metal struck the Shimmer and sent pain shooting through his body. Years of experience had dulled the once-paralyzing waves of agony that such an act had once caused, but it was still far from ignorable.

"You're just a bastion of optimism, aren't you, Savior?"

"I call it prudence."

"You…would…" Robin trailed off. "Oh shit."

The attack had prevented the Titans from seeing the second wave drop their cloak for a few seconds. Robin saw it now: the air was filled with more incoming robots.

"Raven, tell me if I'm wrong, but I doubt solar power and broken magical sword pieces will provide an advantage here." Robin said.

"Wouldn't plan on it."

"Very well then. Titans, stick with the classics." Robin said. The Titans grunted and prepared themselves. Cyborg even pulled out his iPod's ear-buds, suddenly not in the mood for music.

"Yay. Flying machines." Morgue said, as she re-activated her main cannon, switching from solar energy to plain destructive force blasts.

"I guess we'll just have to be all the more magnificent." Gauntlet replied, and then ripped a chunk out of the ground and hurled it into the incoming throngs.

* * *

It was never a good sign when the enemy took your first punch and stopped it cold. Had she managed to actually unleash the Dormouse's EMP blast, Marissa had hoped to damage or outright take out Cyborg, as well as wreck Robin's weaponry and the Titans' ability to communicate. Somehow, they'd seen it coming at the last second. With the element of surprise gone, Marissa had immediately jumped into full-on assault.

Her second punch had gone differently. The Titans had not charged into the fray and dominated like they had with the Abhorred. Indeed, while they had stood their ground, it was clear she'd managed to rock them a touch. Marissa didn't let her sense of accomplishment get to her: the Titans had an incredible track record that included people who were smarter than her. She would stay the line, and adapt as needed. Hopefully.

Projectiles filled the air as Marissa's air-mechs unleashed their weaponry. Said air-mechs consisted of three units. The slower but more heavily armed Flutter-Byes carried machine guns of varying calibers, and the fist-sized Snarks and Boojums carried burning/cutting lasers and modified sonic-cannons respectively. A few more Tweedle-bombs on top of that quickly drove the Titans into a protective circle. Marissa immediately surged part of her air units and Mock-Tanks around to enclose them in a pincer.

"_**Well done Miss Mori."**_

"Sir?"

"_**The Titans adapt remarkably fast though. Do what the leader said before. Turn up the pressure. Even more."**_

"…Yes sir." Marissa said, moving her left hand to a new holographic keypad and beginning to type. She only had two unit types remaining, but one was the hardest to control. On top of everything else…

The master had to know what he was doing. He always did.

It didn't fully chase away the acid taste of fear in the back of Marissa's mouth.

* * *

"Argh!" Cyborg yelled, being driven back a few steps by several Boojums firing on him. Before he could counter, Morgue did it for it, blasting them out of the air with a 'burst' shot of energy. "Someone ELSE who stole my tech! Why did I even bother with copyrights?!"

"What can we say? Not everyone is original." Scalpel said, as he golf-clubbed swung a Mock-Tank into a few of its brothers. Much to his annoyance, the explosion of one did not prompt the explosion of the rest of them. "Except when it's most annoying it seems."

"Nigel, get back here! You're too badly expos-GARGH!" Savior yelled as a Mock-Tank and a Snark shot him in the back, sending him to his knees. A Tweedle-bomb rolled in to deliver the next shot, before Raven slapped it away.

"Robin, buy me some time. Building up again…" Raven said, her eyes glowing black.

"You heard the lady!" Robin yelled, hurling a Birdarang through a Flutter-Bye and then cart-wheeling away from the bullets of several others. Starfire's eye beams tore through them a second later.

--------

"THIS IS FOR MIGHTY CASEY!" Gauntlet yelled, smashing a Tweedle away from him a makeshift baseball bat. "Huh, something went according to plan. Refreshing!"

The Snarks exploded from the ground beneath Gauntlet, their lasers piercing towards his face. A last-moment yellow shield did not stop one of the beams from being only slightly deflected, burning off the top of Gauntlet's right ear.

"GARRRGGHH!" Gauntlet yelled, smashing the small robots while saying words incredibly unfit for polite company and that a few Titans would be surprised he knew. As bad as he had it, Beast Boy had it worse, as he half-smashed a Mock-Tank as a gorilla and then picked it up to try and turn its gun on its fellows. He promptly got a massive electrical shock, his green fur standing up as he bellowed in pain.

The Tweedle-bomb was stopped from killing him by the fact that Cyborg managed to knock it partially aside with a sonic cannon blast. The explosion still engulfed Beast Boy, hurling him backwards into his fellows and crashing down onto the ground.

"B!" Cyborg yelled.

"HOLD THE LINE, CYBORG! I KNOW, BUT HOLD THE LINE!" Robin yelled, blowing up a few more Mock-tanks with an explosive disc. He began doing a quick mental inventory check for how much equipment he had and how rapidly he was going through it…

His staff was out and blocking even as the form dropped down from the sky.

It was still nearly twisted out of his hands by the twin s-bladed staves his attacker wielded. The new robot was a mass of contorting, weaving wires and plastic, a featureless face of metal lines betraying nothing. The weapons it carried did all the necessary talking, as the mech spun its limbs like a helicopter, trying to tear through Robin's guard.

"ANOTHER ONE? REALLY?" Gauntlet yelled, punching the attacking robot with a yellow energy fist. "How did no one notice him buying these robots in bu-ACK!"

The wire design of the robot had semi-absorbed the punch, and before Gauntlet's surprised eyes the mech actually surged up onto his energy power and tried to run/move along its length to get at Gauntlet. Spikes erupted from the Gauntlet power to impale the creation before it did so, and Gauntlet finished the job by smashing it into the ground.

"Please let that be the only one please let that be the only one." Gauntlet said. Several shadows passed over him, as more of the wire robots landed amongst the Titans. "DAMN YOU ECONOMICS OF SCALE!"

**HABER-DASHERS ENGAGED. INITIATING MARCHARES.**

--------

"LOOK OUT!" Savior yelled, defending against one Haber-Dasher's blades even as he tried to dodge Snark laser fire. "THEY'RE GOING FOR GAR!"

"Like hell." Scalpel said, leaping and carving through a Haber-Dasher with one massive strike. It was the only hit he got, as a storm of bullets raked over his body and sent him stumbling backwards before collapsing.

"SCALPEL!" Morgue yelled. She knew the special protective field everyone except Beast Boy was wearing would keep said injuries from being fatal, but it couldn't hold out forever. She tried to both run towards Scalpel and fire at his attackers, only for a missile to explode nearby and knock her off her feet as well. No sooner had she landed then she was forced to transform into bats to get away from another missile (two to be precise), losing _Dyson's Fear _in the process. Robin briefly jerked his head in the direct of the fire, which had come from yet more distant robots. These were classically humanoid in design, like the Haber-Dashers, and were armed with various guns that they proceeded to introduce to the rest of the team.

"STARFIRE! CYBORG! MAKE US A SAFE ZONE! SAVIOR! GAUNTLET! PLUG DEFENSIVE HOLES!"

--------

"You know, I knew we should have let that magnet guy on the roster." Gauntlet said with annoyed bitterness, before he had to dodge fire from a Mock-Tank, Boojum, and a distant Marchare. "I don't care WHAT racial slurs he made!"

"Cyborg, are these things running off some central power source?!" Savior yelled, slicing apart a Haber-Dasher before he took two Boojum blasts in the chest. He rolled as he fell, avoiding Flutter-bye machine gun fire, and slashed the two Boojums out of the air before flipping up.

"I can't tell!" Cyborg yelled in reply, even as four new sonic cannons extended on malleable arms from his shoulders and legs, firing in multiple directions and clearly a hole for Starfire, who surged up and fired off a twin-handed Starbolt. Unfortunately, the action was read by the mechanical army, who mostly cleared out of the way of the shot. "Damn it! All right, you want to play rough, I CAN DAMN SURE DO THAT!"

Savior watched as the blades on Cyborg's head (which came from some Japanese thing he'd liked, Savior didn't know details) fired off, spinning through the air on some unknown inertia (Savior would have guessed magnetic if asked), slicing through robots as it went. Unfortunately, he only had two blades, and there were a lot more robots. One of whom was hurling his bladed stave at Savior, forcing him to dodge backwards.

The Snark slammed into the back of his knee as he did so, sending him tumbling to the ground. Several more Snarks and Boojums zipped up above Savior, weapons charging.

"CRAP!"

The first three exploded almost at the same time. Seemingly confused, they turned towards the direction of their shooter, which gave Morgue and the massive hand cannon of a gun she'd produced to shoot two more down. Savior quickly tore down the rest of them.

"I need some cover, Noel." Morgue said as the white-haired Titan leapt over.

"Don't-never mind. What about Nigel?" Savior said, even as white Shimmer lines returned _Dyson's Fear_ to Morgue. Despite her full face mask, Savior could spot the faint smile that he'd managed to retrieve it. "We-"

"RARRUUGGHHHHH!" Scalpel yelled, leaping through the air while being protected by a Raven shield, before he brought his war hammer down on another Mock-Tank, crushing it so badly it couldn't even manage to explode.

"He's making his own fun." Morgue said, and aimed over Savior's shoulder to shoot an encroaching Tweedle. "Let's make some noise."

"Noise I can relate to." Savior said, forming multiple Shimmer weapons. "Never did quite get the hang of 'fun'."

--------

Robin spun his staff around him, fending off three Haber-Dashers as best he could. That ended with Starfire's eye-beams sliced one in half, allowing Robin to lodge his staff in one to pin it and throw a Birdarang at the other. It knocked the projectile aside, but that was just the feint as Robin re-formed his crimson sword in a blur and slashed down through the robot vertically. The deflected Birdarang flew back into Robin's hand, and he whirled and sent it spinning through the last Haber-Dasher's head as it pulled itself off his staff. He sprinted over and gave the robot another slice to keep it down, yanking his staff free from the ground and running over to a still-down Beast Boy immediately afterward.

"You functional Gar?"

"Oh man that hurt." Beast Boy said, his fur scorched. "I wish I could have gotten that hybrid trick to work…"

"SAVE IT SOLDIER!" Robin yelled, as several Boojums flew over and fired. Robin produced metal discs and hurled them off, and as Beast Boy watched, he was reminded why Robin was the leader as the discs not only hit their targets, but ricocheted off of them to hit the remaining robots.

"ROBIN LOOK OUT!" Beast Boy yelled, turning into an Ankylosaurus a split second before gunfire raked across his armored body. They were followed by several energy cannon shots that almost turned Beast Boy's protection of his teammate on its head, as the green Titan nearly fell on top of Robin from the impact, forcing him to scramble back.

"Ow…I think those were armor piercing…ow…" Beast Boy groaned, turning human again as he clutched at his burned and bloody back. Robin leaned over and did a quick assessment of the wounds.  
"Mostly surface."

"That doesn't help."

"Help's in short supply." Robin said, watching Gauntlet charge towards the Marchares that had shot Beast Boy, a spiked energy shield in front of him holding off their bullets, blasts, and even two fired rockets. Robin thought he heard Gauntlet yell 'Bastard must shop at the same place as Slade!', and despite the situation he chuckled.

Mock-Tanks rolled in, firing destructive plasma, and Robin's brief moment of humor died as he dodged aside. Beast Boy did likewise, and Robin lost him as two more Haber-Dashers dropped down and attacked, blades spinning.

--------

Raven was vaguely aware of Savior, Morgue, and Scalpel having fought their way over to her: her attention was primarily focused on her concentration and her (somewhat deficient) offensive efforts. She had a very good reason for the latter though, and the former was not so great that Savior's brief touch on her shoulder startled her.

"Outside the box time. Raven, momentum!" Savior yelled, leaping high into the air. Raven plucked the thought from his head and reacted instantly: Savior crashed back down onto the ground, a constructed Shimmer orb coiled around his body, and Raven slashed out a lance of black power and sent him spinning through the mechanical forces.

It took Raven a second to realize she wasn't fully on her game, mainly in regards to the fact that Savior's move, while effective, _was not a very good idea_. A second later, the Tweedle-bomb smashed into him from the side and sent him tumbling across the battlefield.

"Damn." Robin said, seeing this. The trouble promptly magnified, as Gauntlet caught a bullet across the side of the head from a Marchare and went down as well with a muffled curse (though to his 'benefit', it made his ears match). "DAMN! PULL BACK!"

"I do not believe we have anywhere to pull back to, Robin!" Starfire called, tossing down Starbolts at anything that wasn't a Titan. Robin jerked his head around, realizing that they had, in fact, been cut off.

"Raven…!" Robin yelled.

"I know, Robin." Raven said, Robin somehow hearing her despite her distance and the battlefield noise. "I need more time. But don't worry. You don't need me."

A slight push on the side of Robin's head via a dark tendril pointed his eyes in the direction Raven wanted him to look, and he saw it.

Terra was coming back. The island's mass may have been poisoned, but as Terra had found out, the sea bed directly around the island was _not_. Terra had torn up as many giant chunks of it as she could manage, and was charging back into the fray.

Unfortunately, the enemy could see this too, and the next thing Robin saw was the aerial units beginning to shift direction towards Terra. Exposed as she was, a mass attack could cut her to pieces.

"TITANS! INCOMING! LET IT THROUGH!" Robin yelled.

"Incoming?" Cyborg said, turning away from the Mock-Tanks he was blasting. His scanners did a complete 360 of the battlefield, and after another two seconds of looking at the readings, he decided. "Right then. Seems like as good a time to use THIS!"

Robin didn't see what Cyborg did.

He _did _see the flash of light in the distance as the T-Oceanus' cannon charged up and fired again, streaking past the Titans into the ranks of the mechanical legions.

"Oh yeah." Robin said, and hit the deck before the explosion did it for him.

* * *

There was always something, some detail not noticed, some oversight performed. It had affected all great or powerful generals and leaders down the ages, from Hannibal's caution to Hitler's lack of it. Marissa wasn't anywhere near those peaks or depths. She was primarily a mechanist, who knew how to use her creations to the best of their ability.

And there was nothing in said ability to counter-act a gigantic, destructive blast firing from a distance and exploding right in the center of her assembled units. The offense was so sudden, and retroactively so possible, that it startled her into indecision for a few seconds.

Those few seconds were all Terra needed to cut through Marissa's defensive push towards her and strike. Her massive sea-rocks came crashing down against the left flank of the robot army, carving several new lines through her ground forces. Marissa immediately turned her attention back to Terra, assigning another whole wing to assault her. They did it, blasting Terra out of the sky in a storm of fire.

Not well enough. Terra had held some rock back for a shield, and that and her armor kept her alive. As she fell back towards the Lord's poisoned ground, she grinned fiercely and held up her middle finger.

Marissa could almost swear the geokinetic could see her.

Terra's rock boulders exploded into a million pebbles, flying upwards at multiple angles and tearing through Marissa's air forces. The Flutter-Byes were the worst affected, and Marissa felt the acid taste in her mouth go all the way to a burn as she realized she'd just lost 3/5th of their numbers.

The Titans were surprised themselves, but they reacted far quicker. The enemy had suffered considerable losses, and they knew it, and they promptly stopped taking a guarded position and laid into Marissa's army with everything they had. Within fifteen seconds her pincher was broken, and the Titans had turned around to press the advantage.

"…_**Titans…"**_

Marissa looked up at the Lord's speaking voice, but he said nothing else. She had no idea if he was angry at all, and if he was, if he was angry at her or his troublesome-as-usual enemies.

"_**Get ready Miss Mori."**_

"As you wish, sir." Marissa said, and resumed typing. First she had all the remaining units hold the line, then sent Unit Z-7 to disable the cannon that had damaged her ranks so badly and to take out the whole vehicle if it had to, or could. With that done, she shifted the Mock-Tanks to disable their self-destruct procedure and proceed with maximized survival parameters, and then individual commands fell away in a blur as Marissa worked away at her task like she was a machine herself.

* * *

"DAMN!" Cyborg yelled, as the readings of the being-attacked T-Oceanus flashed over his eyes with glowing urgency. He quickly activated the auto-pilot and tried to get it off the beach, but he wasn't fast enough to prevent kamikaze Snarks from disabling the main cannon beyond repair. "Robin, we won't be getting another shot off!"

"Then we make sure we DON'T NEED IT! TITANS GO!"

Starfire and Terra unleashed twin punches of solar energy and rock at Robin's command, blowing units apart on air and sea alike. Cyborg gestured at Robin and then launched his cranial blades again, even as Robin raised his sword and charged with them, working with the magnetically-manipulated weapons to carve his way through anything that crossed his path.

--------

"Morgue…" Beast Boy said, landing on Sophie's shoulder as an owl. "I need your help for air cover."

"Done. What's the plan Beast Boy?"

"I've been TOO NICE." Beast Boy growled. "Time to get…REALLY…INHUMAN."

Beast Boy's body shifted in a fashion more violent than Sophie could have recalled seeing, his mass expanding upward and outward. Starfire, in mid-dodge from a leaping Tweedle, felt her breath catch as she saw the alien giant Beast Boy had turned himself into.

"Thanagarian Snare Beast."

"Giant spider?!" Gauntlet half yelled, half gaped. "What the hell can that do?!"

"Less pondering more hitting!" Savior said, sending a Shimmer drill through robotic forces.

"Fine! Gauntlet Smash!" Gauntlet said, forming a giant fist with his own energies and smashing them down on the machines that threatened him.

Snarks, Boojums, and Flutter-Byes swarmed to attack Beast Boy's giant form, but they were met in mid-air by bats carrying tiny marble-sized bombs. Beast Boy, his legs covered with immensely dense chitin, swept out with the limbs, smashing and stomping on whatever robots he could a mass of Mock-Tanks opened fire from his side, he turned his hideous head and fired out reeking yellow webbing. The material covered and stuck to the machines, acids in the alien filament eating into and destroying their forms.

"Huh. Whatever a spider can, apparently." Gauntlet said.

--------

"Whoa! Watch where you're aiming that, B!" Cyborg said, flying up next to Beast Boy before he unleashed all his sonic cannons at his own targets. Having been replaced, Morgue swarmed back to the ground and looked for Scalpel. She found him running from a collection of Haber-Dashers, Marchares, and Tweedles, who were about to pin him down against a cliff face.

"I don't think so." Morgue said, and aimed the _Dyson's Fear_ to provide him rear support.

Just as Scalpel leapt into the air, and with a bellowing cry, swung his war hammer into the side of the cliff. Almost half of the rock face shattered, even as Scalpel landed, turned around, and did a mad dash back towards the robots who had been 'chasing' him. They didn't react as well as he did, as both alien and machine was consumed in a mass of smoke and debris. Swallowing, Morgue swarmed over to the wreckage and reformed just in time for a grimy Scalpel to pop out of the dust.

"Let's see Terra do that!" Scalpel said, triumphantly.

"She likely could. With ease." Morgue replied, her tone grouchy.

"What about the brilliant luring?"

"You mean your stupid risking of your neck?"

"Perhaps we shall compare points LATER!" Scalpel yelled, leaping and kicking a Marchare's head off before charging off to the main Titan offense.

--------

Savior felt the hairs rise up on the back of his own neck, and he knew what was coming.

"A decent second effort, Lord." Raven whispered, sparks of dark energy erupting from her hands and eyes. "And it ends THIS second."

A blur of motion went up into the clouds above, and then from their depths roaring tornado-like funnels of power came surging down, crashing down onto the machine battalion and tearing them to pieces as effectively as Raven's first effort had. Regretfully, they didn't last as long, as the clouds rumbled after several seconds and the tornadoes abruptly broke apart and died, even as Raven grunted and fell to the ground.

It was enough. The Titans kept fighting for a few more seconds before Robin held out his hand to indicate for them to stop.

The machines were retreating, vanishing back into the cracks of the land and the distant horizon. The Titans ceased their offensive, carefully regrouping (while Beast Boy turned back into a human) as the robots did their best to disappear.

"Yeah, that's it! Run away!" Gauntlet yelled, before spinning around to face the rest of the Titans. "Well, what're you guys waiting for?!"

"Hold those horses, Gauntlet." Robin said. "Don't want to go barreling into another trap."

"Ugghhhh…" Beast Boy said. "Those alien animals are rough…I couldn't even tell exactly how I was breathing as that thing."

"Let me help you there, Gar." Raven said, as she began fixing the wounds on Beast Boy's back. Despite the less-than-optimal situation of the second fight, the changeling was the only one to suffered any serious wounds.

"So what now?" Terra asked.

"Do you know anything Raven? About what lies ahead?" Morgue asked.

"I'm adapting to his taint, somewhat…but not enough to tell for certain." Raven said.

"How do you do that anyway, Raven? Can I do it?" Terra said, a myriad of rocks floating near her. "Or shall I keep making do?"

"It's different for both of us Terra…I don't think there's any advice I can offer in regards to you overcoming his defenses."

"Making do it is then." Terra replied, rocks spinning in a helix around her arm.

"I'm not getting anything either." Cyborg said, floating ahead on his jet boots. "That might not mean anything, or it might mean that's what he wants it to mean, or…damn." Cyborg said, spinning around. "I think we should go forward, Robin. Before he can fire up his defenses to withstand a siege, or worse."

"He has a point, Robin." Savior said.

"It is best, when on the offense in war, to not try and go against the momentum too much." Scalpel said. Robin glanced around, the wheels in his head turning.

"Robin…" Raven said. "That structure…terrible things emit from it. The longer it exists, the worse I feel the results will be."

"Right then." Robin said, doing another quick inventory check. "Titans move out. We'll have Gauntlet and Cyborg-"

The water came out of nowhere, erupting from the ground beneath Cyborg like it was a sieve instead of solid rock. Cyborg's cry was swallowed by the boiling liquid, the Titans able to feel the heat even from the distance they were at.

"CYBORG!" Beast Boy yelled, as the mass of water carried Cyborg up into the sky via its own momentum. Several of the Titans fired at it, to no effect, even as the water surged back down and smashed Cyborg into the ground like a hand swatting a fly. The water sluiced off the Titan's limp, sparking form, heading into the distance as the Titans began to give chase.

Raven got the shield up just before the green smoke blasted against it, several Titans recoiling as they got faint traces of the gas despite her defense and found it burned their skin. A more serious burn immediately followed, as a shimmering wave of heat slammed into the Titans and drove them back, the incalescence proving so strong it affected even Starfire.

"…fuck." Gauntlet said. The water had stopped after retreating a few dozen feet, having manifested itself as a human shape now, standing next to two others that had become visible to the Titans.

"So…Titans…" Aguardiente said. Robin, despite his anger, noted that the blue-cloaked man was the only one positioned in a 'serious' stance: Carcinogen was off to the right, leaning against the rock wave behind him with his arms crossed, and Hyperthermia was sitting on the rock behind Aguardiente with one knee drawn up to her chest. "Your reputation precedes you."

"Yeah, and from where we're standing, it appears to be mostly that." Carcinogen said with a smirk.

"Really. We'll see how much trash you talk when they're building you a new face." Beast Boy growled, turning into a lion.

"Big words for a little man." Carcinogen said.

"I'm going to make sure I cram all of them down your throat."

"Who are you?" Robin said, cutting off the discussion before it could continue.

"We're-!" Hyperthermia got out before Aguardiente clamped his hand over her mouth. She kept yelling, her voice a muffled drone: Aguardiente ignored her.

"We are the Lord's will. We are what the world needs." Aguardiente said. Raven's eyes widened slightly.

"_We are what the world needs. We are what the world deserves."_

"Genocide." Raven said.

"Very much so." Aguardiente said, releasing his hand from Hyperthermia's mouth. She affixed her erstwhile teammate with a glare, but said nothing.

"Oh good. I was beginning to worry the Lord learned from his mistakes." Gauntlet said. "Shall we skip right to the part where he betrays and kills you because he thinks you're unworthy pawns, or should we add the extra insult of kicking your asses first?"

Carcinogen snorted, a mist of emerald color emerging from his nose as he did so.

"You think we don't know we're the second ones? We're the finished product, Titans. The final, chosen elite." Carcinogen said.

"Yeah! You might have beaten all those gods and demons and big, scary….powerful…mean…things, but you won't beat us!" Hyperthermia said.

"…LOOK, A BEAR!" Morgue yelled, pointing.

"Huh?!" Hyperthermia yelled, looking behind her. The spark of a metal rod almost hitting her legs made her jump up with another yell. Morgue withdrew the wires from her taser before any of the Genocide members could break them.

"Pity. I was hoping to get this done quickly and knock off for lunch." Morgue said.

"WHY YOU…!" Hypthermia yelled, a heat shimmer erupting all over her body. It faded as Aguardiente put his hand out.

"Your robot companion was just the first." Aguardiente said. "Run, if you're smart. You will advance no further."

"…Perhaps you may very well cut us all down." Robin said, bringing his staff to bear. "We're not moving one step back."

"Oh really?" Aguardiente said.

Robin jerked his head up as he heard the faint whistle. In the back of his head, a voice chimed up that the robots had _retreated_. They had not all been destroyed.

Like the several Tweedle-bombs dropping down at the Titans.

"Oh bugger." Savior said.

The Titans were consumed by the explosion, and the three members of Genocide laughed merrily, the waves of heat making their clothes and hair dance.

The laughter died as the forms surged out of the smoke.

"Right then. Let's go." Aguardiente said, and with the re-appearance of the remains of the robot army at their heels, they lanced forward to do their master's bidding.

* * *

And all the while, Marissa watched. She'd done everything as best as she could see. None of it eased the fear.

The faint dark shadow that appeared by her, touching a hand to her shoulder, did. She glanced up at the trace of the Lord, before returning to the screen. Sometimes, she knew what her master wanted without him saying a word.

"_**Some know what some say…"**_ The Lord said. _**"The best laid plans never survive contact with the enemy, because the enemy has a vote."**_

"That's why we improvise." Marissa said, pressing a button at the center of one of her keypads. The shadowy essence turned around, as a doorway opened behind Marissa's battle platform. A sickly, malignant light lit up inside the chamber, and the floating form in the dark energy pillar that lay within.

"_**How. Very. True."**_


	4. Kickstart My Heart

Chapter 4: Kickstart My Heart

_"Call me a pessimist if you must, but in my mind, had we superhumans among us the world would surely be reduced to a wasteland within months. I'm not a big believer in the good of humanity, I guess. Sure, the current doom and gloom around us plays heavily into my bleak worldview, but this mindset isn't a new one for me. I don't see much altruism in the average man's heart and never have. It's just not in our reptilian/monkey-brain programming. It's all about me-me-me for the average Joe. Everyone has an agenda, and most everyone has a selfish motivation behind his or her actions. If you randomly bestowed superpowers on our population, you'd give these flawed minds the power to inflict their agendas on the world. There are few among us who would stand up to the task of managing the great responsibility that would come with this great power. Sure, there would be pure-hearted and ethical men and women who would try to sway this, but I believe the sheer number of the corrupted would overwhelm them..."_

_-_Rick Remender, _The End League_

"_No man chooses evil because it is evil; he only mistakes it for happiness, the good he seeks."_

_-_Mary Wollstonecraft

* * *

_**The light did not come down: the darkness merely drew away. The three figures standing where the black had retreated from barely noticed each other, their attention drawn to the form that had risen up between all three of them, somehow contrasting the darkness around them with an even darker shade that made up his body.**_

"_**Hello.**__**"**__** The shadow man said. **__**"**__**I am the Lord. Your benefactor and, provided things go as planned, your overseer of your new lives.**__**"**_

_**The three tried to talk, and found no sound coming from their mouths as they did. The Lord waited a few seconds in the silence, before he began snapping his fingers.**_

"_**Your voices still work, but I desired quiet for this introduction. You**__**'**__**ll have them back in due time.**__**"**__** The Lord said. **__**"**__**As I have said, I am the one who has changed you. Over two hundred and seventy people were**__**…**__**chosen for what you three have emerged from. You three are all that remain. The successes of a long process to be**__**…**__**something more than you wished to. Well done.**__**"**__** The Lord said, raising a hand. **__**"**__**However, there are a few more**__**…**__**issues.**__**"**_

_**The Lord turned around, his cloaks re-settling around him as he started heading for one of the three, the other two fading away into the darkness. The girl tried to take a step back, and found like her voice, her legs did not work either.**_

"_**Kyleona Lynessa.**__**"**__** The Lord said. **__**"**__**So precious. Well, at least according to your mother. It**__**'**__**s strange how something **__**'**__**precious**__**'**__** is treated by her. Oh, she cared enough to scream outrage any time someone tried to take you away, and make you hide in closets and under a car once, I believe? During a hot summer day? If she didn**__**'**__**t just fob you off on your grandmother, or let you starve in her trailer while she indulged in her real joys, which was drugs. Yet she kept telling you you were special. Even as you grew into another drug-riddled failure.**__**"**_

_**Kyleona**__**'**__**s eyes grew moist as the Lord spoke, even as she tried to keep a brave face on.**_

"_**Ah, no need to cry. The apple rarely falls far**__**…**__**but if you really had no worth, you would not have survived my process. So maybe she was right, Kyleona. Maybe you are special. And in my service**__**…"**__** The Lord said, holding up a black crystal.**_

_**Kyleona stared, before she put a hand up to her face to confirm the reflection shown in the crystal was hers. Average features that had been on their way to ruin via poor diet, drug abuse, and too much makeup had been re-cast into a near-perfect fusion of pixie and model, thin dye-destroyed hair restored and tinted to a precise white-blonde.**_

"_**You shall be made into how you wish to see yourself. In return for helping me shape the world.**__**"**__** The Lord said. **__**"**__**I will note**__**…**__**there is a price to pay for this though.**__**"**_

_**Kyleona looked up at the Lord, wheels slowly turning behind her eyes.**_

"_**Not of that sort.**__**"**__** The Lord said. **__**"**__**Rather, the material needed to re-shape you had to come from a source. For ease, a very similar source. Lacking any siblings, the best source is**__**…**__**well, the original.**__**"**_

_**The shadows fell away in front of the pair, and Kyelona found her legs worked again as she recoiled from the sight of the woman, barely recognizable, her face a rotting mess, a leper from hell. The woman, despite her injuries, could still scream, and did, silently, over and over.**_

"_**Your mother, Sonya, being the original.**__**"**__** The Lord said, now behind Kyleona. **__**"**__**She always said you were special. So many words, nothing to back them up. You know, deep down, that it was never about you. It was about her. Always about her. She gave you life to feed her ego. But**__**…**__**she is your mother. If this is too much for you, I can give it back. The process is painless. You**__**'**__**ll retain your powers. You**__**'**__**ll still be**__**…**__**special, and in my service. You just won**__**'**__**t be special in her eyes.**__**"**_

_**Kyleona turned to look at her new master.**_

"_**It WOULD be exceptional if you could be that generous, even after all she**__**'**__**s done.**__**"**__** The Lord said. **__**"**__**Maybe it would mark you as even more special.**__**"**_

_**Kyleona turned to look back at her mother, as the voice continued to whisper away in her ear.**_

"_**But you know that SHE**__**'**__**D never see that.**__**"**_

…

"_**What took you s**__**'**__**long?**__**"**__** The black man said, his accent becoming a touch stronger in his impatient tone.**_

"_**Tremaine Dedrian.**__**"**_

"_**Ohhhh, you know my name. How could ya**__**…"**__** Tremaine started before his mouth abruptly closed.**_

"_**Please don**__**'**__**t over-use your right to speak. I dislike that.**__**"**__** The Lord said. **__**"**__**To answer your question, not everyone has as clear-cut a goal as you. That**__**'**__**s good**__**…**__**and also not. You were strong enough to survive my process, but there are the reasons behind that. They must be addressed. Lest you forget your new position.**__**"**_

_**Tremaine**__**'**__**s eyes blazed.**_

"_**I will accept your anger. You have a lot of reasons to be angry. I will do what I can to not give you more.**__**"**__** The Lord said. **__**"**__**But your anger is how we met, Tremaine. I would rather not have it also make us part ways. Understand this. You are not in charge. You have your power only as long as you are following in the general direction of my goals. You have the ability to think for yourself only to the point where it does not serve my purposes. I will not make you worship me, and I will not**__**…**__**use you. Not like HE did. But these freedoms are a gift, and they can be taken away. And worse.**__**"**_

_**The Lord curled his fingers towards the Jamaican man, and he recoiled away from the Lord, clutching his head as mumbling wails leaked from his sealed lips.**_

"_**Remember this. There is a very large stick behind the carrots.**__**"**__** The Lord said. **__**"**__**Now, on the subject of carrots**__**…"**_

_**The pain faded from Tremaine**__**'**__**s head, and he turned glowering, angry eyes on the Lord.**_

"_**You are allowed to be angry. Do try and learn something from it.**__**"**__** The Lord said, as he produced a black case. **__**"**__**You**__**'**__**ve already learned why humanity needs to be purged. And why loyalty is so important. Of course, for some, it**__**'**__**s just something to be traded away.**__**"**_

_**The Lord raised a hand, and several chained figures became illuminated on a nearby wall. Tremaine**__**'**__**s eyes widened at the sight of them.**_

"_**Like you so-called friends did. Tossing you away so they could get away with the product. It was easy for them.**__**"**__** The Lord said. **__**"**__**None of them could ever understand what that man did to you. The anger and violence it planted, well, that was only useful to them up until they decided it wasn**__**'**__**t. So they threw your life away. For product.**__**"**__** The Lord said, opening the case to reveal the tools and drugs within. **__**"**__**So, why don**__**'**__**t you let them ENJOY what they set you up and left you to die for.**__**"**_

"…_**what about me new powers?**__**"**__** Tremaine said, his cocky/defiant front and the cold rage that fueled having faded somewhat at what the Lord had produced.**_

"_**Oh by all means, test them out. But you might find that they make it all**__**…**__**too quick.**__**"**__** The Lord said. **__**"**__**I**__**'**__**ll see to it, Tremaine, that you don**__**'**__**t suffer any more. Why should anyone else have that gift?**__**"**_

…

"_**I**__**'**__**m not sure if I**__**'**__**m all that enthused about my choice of partners.**__**"**__** The older man said as the darkness drew away from him. While both Kyleona and Tremaine were clearly on the pre-side of thirty, the last man looked more on the close side of fifty, faint traces of gray already starting to settle into his close-cut dark red hair.**_

"…_**I do not recall giving greater hearing as part of your powers, Brody Whelan.**__**"**__** The Lord said, and briefly paused as an idea crossed his mind.**_

"_**That**__**'**__**s all me. I**__**'**__**ve learned that if you can hear a pin drop, you have a lesser chance of it getting stuck in your foot.**__**"**_

"_**Strange, considering your life**__**…"**_

_**The blast of water parted in mid-air as the Lord held up a hand, each stream going to either side of him. Brody did not seem alarmed at this fact.**_

"_**Don**__**'**__**t do that again.**__**"**__** The Lord said.**_

"_**Then don**__**'**__**t bring up the past.**__**"**_

"_**If you really wanted to lay it to rest, Brody, you**__**'**__**d have had me fix**__**…"**_

"_**No.**__**"**__** Brody say, his right arm transforming back to flesh and blood to touch its imperfection on the side of his face, a mass of burn tissue that covered most of his right cheek, a good part of his jaw, and some of his neck. **__**"**__**I**__**'**__**ll remember it as I see fit. It**__**'**__**s none of YOUR business.**__**"**_

"_**Considering I repaired your mind enough so that your actions are based on thought and not on rage, Brody, you may want to consider that there is nothing about you that is not my business.**__**"**_

"_**Not from where I**__**'**__**m standing.**__**"**_

"_**Hmmmh. Just remember that**__**'**__**s not always your choice.**__**"**_

"_**I suppose my so-called partners aren**__**'**__**t either.**__**"**_

"_**Each has their use. I will be taking considerable steps to ensure a lack of friction.**__**"**__** The Lord said.**_

"_**Why should I trust you?**__**"**_

"_**A con to the end. And not without reason.**__**"**__** The Lord said. **__**"**__**All I can offer you is my word. And the fact that my experiences have taught me to keep it.**__**"**_

"_**Really?**__**"**_

_The darkness cast itself away again, some time before._

"_Hello John._

"_I suppose you may be a little surprised about your current circumstances, considering how they were when we parted ways. In truth, I will admit I was tempted to actually do what you believed I was going to do. But a bargain is a bargain, and for how it ended, you held your end up. You said you would kill the Titans, and you did. Circumstances ruined your work, but that was beyond you and not in the contract. Perhaps I could have handled this fact better…but sometimes a touch of human failing sneaks its way back into me. Hence my bitterness and the…not as smooth as it could have been end of your deal. But you survived it. I am really not surprised._

"_As requested, your brain tumor has been drawn back and locked into cellular stasis. Your cancer will not re-grow, or spread, in your brain tissue any more, though I cannot guarantee anything in regards to the rest of your body. It will likely depend on what you'll be planning on doing when I return you to your world."_

"_Work. There's still so much more to do."_

"_I'm sure there is. Just don't let your renewed lease on life make you forget the finer details of how you had to teach others, John. I also suggest you be prepared when you are returned: things may not have progressed as you would have preferred. "_

"_I have never doubted…my ability to craft."_

"_Artists never should."_

"_**Yes. Really." The Lord said. "But if my word is not enough…"**_

_**The man who appeared from the dark was old and frail, like the Lord had pulled him out of a hospital bed. He wheezed, eyes darting about in fear, an unpleasant looking gag in his mouth and age having withered his Spanish features.**_

"_**He had a few names. Red Pulse. 'Sycho Switch'. The Madcannon. But by any name, it was Fermin Cande, the man who killed your parents. Not because he supported either side of the troubles of your country, but because he had a compulsive desire to use his particular psychokinetic powers to make things explode, and your issues provided a convenient cover for it. A man who loves his work always finds the best place to make it happen." The Lord said, walking over to the man. "Of course, that was a long time, many years in prison, and one brain surgery ago. But considering all the efforts you made to revenge yourself on the world, and your…considerable lack of success in doing so, all because of what he did to get his jollies…well, I'm not the one who needs to make a decision here. I'll let Fermin speak for himself." The Lord said, walking past Fermin as he yanked the gag off. Fermin sputtered for a few seconds, eyes bugging out of his head at the stock-still form of Brody Whelan. He'd spent long enough in prison himself to know what that wire-taunt stance meant.**_

"_**Brody, that's your name, listen to me…!" Fermin gasped. "I was sick! My powers made me sick! They went into my head, cut it out, made me sane! I'll never get out of prison! Just let me go back there and rot! I can't ever take back what I did, but I'm being punished! I accept it, I'm changed, for pity's sake, I'M SORRY, just let me go…!"**_

"_**Oh yes…" The Lord's voice said, whispering in Brody's ear. "If once is not enough…I'm very skilled at resuscitation."**_

_**Brody's hand clenched into a fist, drops of boiling water falling from the limb and striking the ground with a hiss.**_

"_**Extreme resuscitation."**_

"_**NOOOOOOOOOOOO…!" Was all that emerged from the darkness before the noise swallowed it completely. Having observed it all, Marissa sat with the black cat in her lap, the Lord appearing before her.**_

"_**I assess the power of a will by how much resistance, pain, torture it endures, and knows how to turn to its advantage." The Lord said. "What say you, Miss Mori? Speak freely, if it is what I need."**_

"…_**I do…wonder if you're taking an unnecessary risk, sir. In leaving them so much freedom." Marissa said. "They might turn on you."**_

"_**That is true." The Lord said, floating the black cat to his hand and petting it. "I COULD break their minds completely, leave them little more than extensions of myself. But that's not what we need, Miss Mori. My previous attempts to completely run the show…well, you're aware of the long-term problems that caused me."**_

"_**Yes sir."**_

"_**But as said, and unlike last time, they are extensions of myself. I will make sure they understand that." The Lord said. "I will take what they are, and what they wish, and craft it to produce a superior product. Just like with you, Miss Mori. Just like with the world."**_

"_**What if it doesn't work?"**_

"_**I have contingency plans." The Lord said. "I actually wish to speak to you about one. There's one more member of Genocide to craft, Miss Mori. Unlike the previous three, I will require a great deal of your aid."**_

"_**Yes sir…"**_

"_**I sense hesitation."**_

"…_**I wonder exactly how effective these three will be, if you're already seeking to create another."**_

"_**Well Miss Mori…there is only one answer to that." The Lord said. "We won't know how effective they'll be…until we see."**_

* * *

There were times when Beast Boy hated his powers.

They were few, but they were there. Sometimes he hated the way his parents' improvised cure to Sakutia had turned his skin green, forever setting him apart from the rest of humanity and most of the 'super-humanity' that made up his peers. Usually, for someone who enjoyed being the comedian and the center of attention, the green skin was a blessing, and usually, that was the mindset Garfield Logan adapted. But even he had his dark moments, when he wished he could just be normal. He accepted them. No sane superhero went without them.

Sometimes he hated the way his powers affected him at random times. The several tests he'd had done over the years indicated his powers were mostly stable and on course to remain that way, but the key word was 'mostly'. There were times when the instincts and mindsets of the animals he took would bleed over to his consciousness, thinking processes so alien to natural human cognitive function that it almost felt like a snapback form of insanity. Worse, there was no real way to anticipate them; the odds of them showing up were completely random. Gar just did his best to roll with the punch, whenever it came. At least it was purely mental. Cyborg and Raven didn't have that blessing; what sometimes encroached on their human minds was literally in their blood (or body, in Cyborg's case).

Sometimes, he hated how people pitied him, that slight reflection in the back of their gaze that indicated they felt his existence was somehow sorrowful. It wasn't. Despite his own feelings at times, and the scars of years of battle, there were few lives that Beast Boy would trade his own for. He should have died the day that monkey had bitten him. He would skirt close to death many times after that first time as well, and find his way back each time. If that was not a blessing, Beast Boy did not know what was.

And sometimes…he hated his clothes. All the other Titans wore carefully constructed clothing, designed to protect them better than the average garment could. Unfortunately for Beast Boy, his outfit had to have a different form of specialized construction. Originally conceived by Doom Patrol overseer Dr. Niles Caulder, his outfit utilized a unique form of 'molecular dispersement' to shift out of reality when it detected the unique bio-rhythm that triggered every time Beast Boy transformed, hence keeping him from losing or tearing apart his outfit with the many alternate forms he could assume. Despite efforts from several brilliant minds, no one had ever been able to 'improve' on the costume design, which acted as normal clothing otherwise. Normal clothing, as many people had found out, offered poor protection against the hostilities of the world.

Usually, Beast Boy could use his powers to compensate. Here, that fact wasn't holding up. He'd been the only one hurt thus far, and there was no animal in the few seconds he had to think that could have protected him from the explosions the Tweedle robots unleashed by converging on the Titans. Raven and Gauntlet, with a little help from Savior, had had to step up and shield them from the attack, and the fact that taking the blow affected them was clear. Raven's head snapped back like she had been struck, and she'd stumbled a few seconds before Scalpel had caught her and helped her keep her feet. Gauntlet, on the other hand, had spasmed with a loud grunt, before putting his hand to his nose and finding blood on the tips of his fingers when he withdrew it.

"Everyone all right?" Robin asked.

"Better than watching _Twilight_." Gauntlet replied. Beast Boy dearly wanted to laugh, to toss off another joke, but he found that that part of him just wouldn't respond. It had settled into a box, waiting for its time to return. And as long as the Titans were on this island, Beast Boy suspected that its time would not come.

He also wanted to kick himself, because he knew the reason that Gauntlet and Raven had performed such an abrupt, painful shield was for him. All the other Titans had their special armor: if _he'd _had it to they could have scattered and regrouped, certain in their assessment that all of them could have rolled with the punch. But he was odd man out, and so they'd structured their defense around him, and by extension the rest of the Titans.

Sometimes, Beast Boy really hated his powers.

But those brief moments of loathing couldn't even compare to the low, seething animus he felt towards his enemy. That was also something he'd felt a few times throughout his life. He'd felt it towards Nicholas Galtry, who had failed Gar in every way a human being could, and willingly. He'd felt it towards General Zahl, a villain who had seemingly killed his second family, the Doom Patrol, years ago. He'd felt it towards Slade Wilson, who'd nearly ruined Terra and proven such a vicious thorn in the Titans' sides…

Those three men had something in common: they were all dead, by their own hands.

Beast Boy truly hoped that the usual result for those he felt such enmity towards would come to pass.

"Beast Boy, get Cyborg. Everyone else, let's go." Robin said, putting his sword away for a moment and gripping his staff in both hands. "NOW!"

The Titans erupted from the smoke, only to find Genocide reacting immediately, and bringing backup with them as well. The robotic legions, re-assembled and undaunted by nature, surged over and around the trio. Thrown explosives, energy blasts, and dark power met them in turn, smashing and tearing them apart. Beast Boy turned into a gorilla and pounced down on a Marchare, tearing it apart and throwing both pieces at a Mock-Tank (which missed, but that wasn't Beast Boy's concern) before he turned into a greyhound and sprinted over to where Cyborg lay.

The blast of water barely missed, hammering down inches from Beast Boy's nose. The heat of the liquid was so intense Beast Boy not only scrambled away, he turned into a frilled lizard to avoid a residual sear-burn on his skin. Crawling up onto a rock, Beast Boy turned into a bear to smash a Flutter-Bye out of the air, before turning his attention to Aguardiente, who was standing on his own rock some distance away.

"So, your first move is a sneak attack. Why should I be surprised?" Beast Boy said.

"If the animal can't see it coming, maybe they just don't deserve to live." Aguardiente said. Beast Boy's only reply was a snort, before he abruptly disappeared.

"…he doesn't have…" Aguardiente said, before Beast Boy's green mass exploded back into existence above the blue-robed figure, the changeling going from the form of a fly to a hippopotamus instantaneously and crashing down onto Aguardiente, driving him into the rock beneath Beast Boy's feet.

"And if the person can't live up to his own standards, he should shut the hell up." Beast Boy growled.

The water erupted beneath him even faster than he had anticipated, blowing him up into the air even as the boiling hot liquid scorched his thick blubbery skin. Beast Boy turned into a leopard to land better, sprinting away a bit before whirling back around. The rock face split open, Aguardiente emerging from within it, seemingly none the worse for wear.

"So, does this mean you'll fall silent then?" Aguardiente said. Beast Boy responded by turning into a gorilla, seizing up the nearest boulder, and hurling it at the villain. Aguardiente dodged to the side with a disturbingly boneless grace, his hand extending and water erupting from his palm at high pressure. Beast Boy dove under it, turning into a greyhound once more and sprinting towards Aguardiente.

"This again?" Aguardiente said, holding up his hands. Spheres of roiling water appeared, spheres which hit the ground around Beast Boy with the force of bombs, one of them actually sending a Mock-Tank tumbling end over end as it tried to get its bearings on Beast Boy. Drops of sizzling water struck Beast Boy's sides and legs, but he did not lessen his speed, reaching the watery villain and leaping.

Aguardiente drew back a hand to fire a point-blank shot.

Then Beast Boy transformed again. The moment of observation Aguardiente got seemed to suggest he had turned into some kind of fuzzy baby bird.

Specifically, a fulmar. Whose name translated to 'foul gull'. Said name came from the infant's ability to vomit a disgusting, stinking oil as a defense mechanism.

Beast Boy proceeded to do that directly into Aguardiente's face.

It did not succeed in blinding the villain: his optical setup had been altered too much for that. It was still enough to make the Genocide member stumble back, Aguardiente barely repressing a gag before reaching up and wiping at the repulsive liquid.

"…Charming!" Aguardiente snapped, before his form rippled and a spray of water dispersed the offensive fluid. "You should know, though, that oil and water don't mix!"

The black force impacted against Aguardiente with the force of a wrecking ball, sending the villain flying nearly seventy-five feet before he crashed violently into the ground, his body disappearing into a cloud of black dust.

"Only if you don't stir it hard enough." Raven said, her arm still outstretched and glowing black, Beast Boy settling down on her shoulder as an owl. Nearby, Cyborg's limp form was carefully slipped away into a hidey-hole, Raven's dark power doing what it could to hide and protect him. "Then again, with how much he's violated your body, I'm amazed he held true to any laws of physics."

The lance of water flew from the smoke, so quick that, despite Raven's best efforts to dodge, it clipped her cape. To Beast Boy's credit, he remained firmly perched on her shoulder, dark eyes watching as Aguardiente rose from the dust on a pillar of water.

"Violation…" Aguardiente said, streams of water breaking off from his tower and whirling around him. "You would call it that."

"Allow me to redefine it." Raven replied.

The water circles slashed towards Raven. Raven's form whirled and vanished, Beast Boy going with her. The liquid blades slashed through the dark, before a black-encased tiger flew towards Aguardiente, snarling its rage.

"Interesting." Aguardiente said, and then Beast Boy pounced. He didn't need body armor. His friends were protection enough.

* * *

Beast Boy's thoughts were mirrored by Gauntlet, though he certainly wasn't complaining about the protection he had. Though he was about to, as he flattened the Marchare into the ground for the third time, just for the robot to try and drag itself up to continue attacking with its bare metal hands.

"Maybe I'm on the wrong side. The way these things fight, they must have one hell of a dental plan." Gauntlet said, and settled for ripping out a chunk of rock from the island and smashing it down onto the robot. "There. Now I just need to learn how to do that 1000x better, and we won't need Terra."

The Boojum sonic blast caught Gauntlet directly in the ear, and only the special protection Cyborg had handed out kept his brains from being reduced to jelly. Falling onto his side, Gauntlet was vaguely aware of wire-bodies thudding down around him, bladed staffs at the ready.

The next awareness he had was about twelve seconds later, and he took the fact that he wasn't dead or in immense pain as a good sign. His senses continued to clear, just in time for a black-clad hand to appear in front of his vision.

"Gauntlet? You all right? Say something." Savior said, snapping his fingers.

"Open up, Mr. Mailbox, it's time for your breakfast…" Gauntlet babbled. Savior narrowed his eyes, glancing over at his team leader as Robin touched down from a leap and joined them.

"You want me to check for a concussion?" Savior asked Robin, who quickly crouched before Gauntlet and whipped out a mini-flashlight.

"Pupils are the same size. Gauntlet, is your vision all right? Do you hear a ringing in your ears?"

"SORRY, I CAN'T HEAR YOU OVER THE RINGING IN MY EARS!" Gauntlet yelled, getting up, glancing at the shredded-remains of the Haber-Dashers behind Robin and Savior.

"He's fine." Morgue said, strolling up, in the midst of reloading her secondary guns. More Flutter-Byes and Snarks buzzed the group, and a Mock-Tank opened fire before Robin blew it to pieces with an explosive disc.

"We can't have these robots pestering us, not with the Lord's new slaves fighting us as well. Spread out and focus on their destruction. If one of the Lord's minions attacks you, distract and flee. We can't, and won't, all be as lucky as Gauntlet." Robin said.

"OKAY, BUT WHAT'S THE PLAN?" Gauntlet yelled again. The concerned look Robin and Savior gave him made him drop the act. "Got it. First the robots, then the monsters."

"I do wonder what we will do if the Lord unveils a gorilla with a diver's helmet for its head." Morgue said, and turned into a cloud of bats before Gauntlet could reply, flying away.

"…There's a reference I'm not getting here, isn't there." Savior said.

"Considering 80 percent of what Gauntlet says is a reference you don't get, you should be used to it." Robin said, before turning and disappearing behind some rocks.

"You're seriously all right, Gauntlet?" Savior asked again, after watching Robin go, though he did not look at the young man as he spoke, instead scanning for enemies.

"Yeah, I'm starting to hear properly. Remind me not to do that again."

"Everyone has their blind spots."

"You would know." Gauntlet said, speaking before he thought. Despite the noise of the battlefield, Gauntlet felt a chill semi-silence descent after he'd spoken.

"…Yes." Savior said, and leapt off in another direction, heading towards a cloud of flying robots trying to perform what seemed to be a flanking maneuver. Gauntlet watched him go, only vaguely aware his hands were curling into fists so tight they were painful.

He didn't want to think about it. He couldn't remember the night, and that was that. The supposed deeds, the choices, the betrayal, all that didn't matter. All that mattered…

The low, thudding impact distracted Gauntlet, immediately followed by a echoing roar. Gauntlet looked up at the descending Blacktrinian form and then skipped aside as he crashed down, the ground cracking beneath Scalpel's feet.

"Oh what is this, speed dating?" Gauntlet said. A tiny cheer went up in the back of his head: he could still quip!

"Sorry, Robert, you're not my type. Also, I'm afraid, we have bigger issues." Scalpel said, standing up. Gauntlet would have asked just what kind of _bigger issues, _but he never got a chance. The rocky cliff face Scalpel had come from abruptly exploded, spraying rock pieces and dirt everywhere.

A few moments later another form tumbled from the smoke, rolling awkwardly down the side of the shattered cliff face before coming to a stop nearby.

"That wasn't supposed to happen!" Hyperthermia said, getting up and trying to brush the dirt off her white track suit. "Stupid rock! Melt properly!"

"…This is either a case of hidden depths, or the Lord's hiring practices have somehow sunk even lower." Gauntlet said.

"She did manage to chase me over here." Scalpel commented, getting his weapons ready.

"There is that. There's also this. Hey! You!" Gauntlet said, trying to get Hyperthermia's attention. "So tell me, who made the trailer you live in? Windstream?"

"Well, actually it…SHUT UP! THAT'S DONE AND I'M NEVER GOING BACK! NEVER NEVER NEVER!" Hyperthermia yelled, actually stomping her feet in anger.

"Wow, I was just guessing." Gauntlet said.

"Screw you! I'm worth more than you ever were! I am chosen of the master, granted powers beyond contrare! I am Hyperthermia! Fear me, if you dare!" Hyperthermia said, striking a combat pose.

"…You know, I don't know what was worse about that sentence; the malapropism or the fact you ripped off _Shrek 2._"

"It's a GOOD MOVIE!" Hyperthermia said, shaking her fist.

"Wait…you control heat. Why are you named Hypothe-" Scalpel began.

"HYPERTHERMIA! HYPPPERRRR! H-Y-P-E-R! You stupid alien, I'm going to kick your ass so hard…you'll…have a really sore ass!" Hyperthermia said, contorting her hands, heat beginning to rise in a distinct shimmer from them.

"Okay, so Stage 1. We got her mad. How do we use this?" Gauntlet said. Scalpel did not get a chance to reply immediately, as Hyperthermia unleashed blasts of flesh-destroying heat, Gauntlet feeling them even _with _his personal shields and despite dodging them.

"I vote against making her madder." Scalpel said. "How about we make her doubt herself and/or despair?"

"So, what, say her butt's big?"

"MY BUTT IS NOT BIG!"

"Keep telling yourself that, honey."

"The master made me perfect! He fixed every flaw!" Hyperthermia yelled.

"Did you know your right eye is half an inch lower than your left?"

"…No it isn't!" Hyperthermia said. To Gauntlet's mild surprise, she actually pulled out a hand mirror as she spoke and checked. "Hah! No, it isn't!"

"Whatever. It doesn't matter what the Lord did for you. He's a bastard-coated bastard with bastard filling. You DO know that, right? You _know _he's going to just use you up and spit you out, right?" Gauntlet said.

"Says you! The last ones were flawed, useless! We're the new and improved versions!" Hyperthermia said.

"The second trophy wife always says that."

"TROPHY THIS!" Hyperthermia yelled, thrusting her hands behind her. Gauntlet could barely make out the shimmering effect before Hyperthermia erupted forward towards the Titan at high speed.

As it turned out, Gauntlet's choice of a cartwheel dodge instead of a block was a wise one. Hyperthermia continued onward towards the rock protrusion behind him, the stone literally vaporizing in her path before she tripped and finished her charging leap in a screaming tumble.

"Is there some brick wall or cinderblock I can banter with? I think it would be a better use of my talents." Gauntlet said.

"It's not her continued poor witticisms that concerns me, Gauntlet." Scalpel said, landing next to his companion from his own dodge. "I'm more concerned that she keeps emitting enough heat to spontaneously convert granite matter to a gaseous state."

"I was trying to ignore that myself."

"Then I am going to make you unhappier." Scalpel said, as Hyperthermia picked herself up off the ground, pulling her semi-detached hood back over her face as she did so. "We have an enemy capable of unleashing diathermic power to the degree that she can evaporate solid rock, mixed with so little control that she almost broke her own neck charging at you. Oh yes, and my species dislikes intense heat. The longer we fight her, the weaker I'm going to get."

"You! Stand still!" Hyperthermia yelled, pointing at Gauntlet.

"You know, I've heard that a million times, but you have convinced me! I WILL stand still!" Gauntlet quipped back.

"…huh?" Hyperthermia said with genuine confusion.

Gauntlet punched into the ground. A second later his gauntlet energies exploded out of the earth in front of Hypertheria and struck her under the chin, sending her flying backwards with another cry.

"I say, nice girl, but about as sharp as a bag of used golf balls." Gauntlet said in a broad southern accent.

"OWWWWWWWW!" Hyperthermia shrieked/cried, getting back up as she held her chin.

"Hm. Pulled that more then I meant to." Gauntlet said.

"You always were a lollypop for a pretty face." Scalpel said, hoisting his war hammer.

"Sucker, Nigel."

"You're one of those too."

"FUCK YOU ASSHOLES!" Hypthermia screamed, thrusting out her hands. The blast of heat was nearly invisible by itself, but the six foot groove it seared/melted across the ground was more than enough to indicate its presence and path.

"I swear that my decision to continually enrage her WILL be vindicated." Gauntlet said, before a quick glance to the side revealed Scalpel was gone, having immediately leapt into the air to dodge. "NoelsrightIdotalktoomuch!"

* * *

Noel, at the moment, didn't really care how much Gauntlet talked. In truth, the days when Gauntlet's endless blabber was one of his bigger irritations seemed so far away.

Everything did. All the times when he thought things couldn't get worse. The Troika tossing him out a window. Jack Djinn framing him for his crimes. Slade driving him to madness. The terrible events that constantly befell Jump City and the world at large. One did not speak any beliefs one had about 'disaster peaking' in the superhero business if one knew what was good for one's self, and how capriciously mean karma could be for such claims.

Yet between them and this, Noel would have taken them. At least he had the excuse of pure outside forces in all those other events. This time…

Did any of this matter? Noel's thoughts kept coming back to that, his bad analytical habits unable to stop their yammering even as he zeroed in on the mass of flying robots, who were trying to pin down Starfire. Yes, the world had to be saved, kept out of the Lord's insane hands. He had to fight as hard as he could, he owed his teammates that and worlds more. But even if they won…

You can't fight what you are. Things had changed, broken, and Noel didn't know if they could outdo the king's horses and men this time. He saw it in the slight pauses his teammates went through whenever they had to speak or interact with them. He'd betrayed them, and they couldn't forget it. Couldn't forgive it, despite any claim or desire to the contrary. Maybe it would be better not to force it. Maybe once this was done, he should just leave…

To go where? Even after the Battle of Metropolis, Raven had come with him, and ultimately they'd ended up right back where they'd started. Back in Jump. Home. For him and Raven. Now…

Savior scrambled up the rocky protrusion, his immediate mind running a swift geometry problem through his head, even as Shimmer tendrils probed the rock shard he was attached to. It had to be firm enough.

Did she want to go with him? Did he have the right to make that request? Run the risk of breaking the team? Take Raven from the only home she had herself? Better to go on his own. Take his mark of Cain and head off.

Except that guaranteed nothing. The team might break up no matter what he chose to do. Trust, _true_ trust, was among the rarest things in this world, and he'd broken it. You could present all the self-justifications and outside reasons done by evil shadow gods you wanted, but when it came down to it the Lord had perfectly arranged things. Had it just been him who'd killed the Titans, using Noel as a pure puppet, Raven would have told them immediately. Instead, he'd caused her enough doubt that she'd taken over a year to mull it over. In doing THAT, he'd taken a horrible situation and made it verge on irredeemable.

He might as well be irredeemable.

Yet if he left, where could he go? He'd have nothing. Even if, by some miracle, this secret never came out to the wider superhero community, Noel would still know.

There might be no way to win here. It wasn't indulgent self-reprisal: it was simple fact. A fact that kept banging away at the back of his head, needing no Lord-manipulation to do so. A fact that Noel feared would undermine him. Would set him down the same road again.

You can't fight what you are.

_So what am I, then?_

Savior, on the other hand, was airborne. His personal demons may have never loomed larger, but they hadn't taken control of him (yet). Having seized onto the rock platform and tossed himself through the air, the Titan fired off multiple Shimmer strands and turned them into a field of whirling blades. The flying robots, to their credit, detected his approach and turned to counter-attack, but between the Shimmer and his defenses Savior was not slowed a bit, smashing through the robots and leaving a rain of burning debris in his wake. Savior spun in mid-air as gravity returned, slashing out with his weapons one more time to prevent any possible retaliation aimed at his back, before spinning back around to face the earth.

He found, instead, a massive cloud of blackish-green gas. Snarling in alarm, Savior tried to re-adjust his position and fire off Shimmer lines to keep himself out of the fog…

Which left him wide open for the cheap shot that did happen, a lancing funnel of lime-green toxins that struck him in the side and back, the Titan falling into the deadly gas like a broken toy. From his own rock protrusion, Carcinogen chuckled nastily to himself; they'd never seen him coming in the old days either.

"This what da Lord so turned-up about? This half eediat? Feh." Carcinogen said, stealing a glance over his shoulder to make sure he didn't fall for the same trick. Hopping down to a lower part of the protrusion, the Jamaican scanned the poisonous cloud for another few seconds, looking for any indication that something was disrupting it in preparation or attempting to escape. The toxin's mass remained undisturbed, and Carcinogen's face split into a cruel grin. He'd always believed superheroes were all hype.

Ironically, had Carcinogen stayed up to admire his handiwork for another few seconds, he would have been better off. Instead, he jumped down to ground level. In his next heartbeat, Savior leveled the ground, tearing up through the rock next to the member of Genocide like the mole from hell. Carcinogen's shocked face did not see the Shimmer-construct over Noel's own; all he got to see was Savior's equally white-clad fist as he slammed it across Carcinogen's cheek.  
Savior's ambush proved to be less effective than he'd hoped; upon impact Carcinogen's face semi-caved in under his touch, like he was punching a sponge rather than a human head. Worse, a blast of green smoke erupted from the blow, something that would have forced the Titan back if he wasn't already leaping. Pain shot through Noel's hand; between his personal shielding and the Shimmer he'd dug out of the grip of Carcinogen's death cloud before it could start doing damage, but it seemed even they couldn't protect him from direct contact with Carcinogen's body. Shimmer lines lanced out, carrying Savior away from the staggering Jamaican, even as it tried to get all of the green sludge off of its host's hand before it could do proper damage.

It did one last thing as well; firing another strand past Carcinogen and slashing into the rock protrusion the Genocide member had leapt down from. The Genocide member recovered from the punch just in time to see the Shimmer retracting.

The rock it had loosened crashed down on him two seconds later. Carcinogen was driven onto his knees, a grunting yell escaping his lips.

The rock, on the other hand, was struck by another eruption of green smoke, the emission shattering the dense stone into pieces that clattered down around the villain. Savior glanced at the pieces and wished he hadn't; the chunks were disintegrating under the effects of Carcinogen's body. Lovely.

"Thanks for the static cloud. Made the ground easy to dig through." Savior said, trying to cover his concern with bravado.

"I du' command electricity, mon." Carcinogen said with another growl, starting to stand up.

"…what?"

"I said I don't command electricity!"

"What did…you idiot. Static means stationary!"

"I don't command paper, neither!" Carcinogen said, back on his feet.

"…WHAT?"

"Hah. Got you, mon. Sorry, I ain't DAT dumb." Carcinogen said, flashing another cruel smirk. "You pretty dumb, though."

"Just keep thinking that." Savior said, flicking his eyes to the cloud he'd fallen into seconds ago. It had somewhat dissipated, but that didn't mean anything.

"You wanna talk thinkin'? Kay, how 'bout this? I a gas, man. You gotta little somethin' something' to keep from being melted straight out, jus' now. But you still see. Still breathe, too. So it gotta let air in." Carcinogen said, black and green gas flowing out from his hands. "I just gotta find dah right mix to'-"

Savior's lancing strike took Carcinogen right in the chest. It proceeded to go right THROUGH his chest, the black leather dissolving into more green gas. Savior yanked his talent back before he saw what extended exposure did to it; the Shimmer's main weakness was blades, but acidic materials fell under a risky gray area for him as well.

"Hah. Dat don't tickle, but it don't do much either. Getting it yet, superhero?" Carcinogen said. "Well, more like forgetting it. Boss likes to talk about what he made you do. How easy it-"

Savior didn't bother with subterfuge the second time: he just grabbed up the nearest big rock and part threw, part slammed it into his foe. This time, Carcinogen didn't just stand there and take it; his own hand thrust out and fired a blast of acidic smoke that broke the second rock as easily as the first, Savior retracting the Shimmer strands with a low hiss. The Jamaican let out another brief laugh, spinning his wrist to product a mini-cloud cyclone above his two fingers.

"Yeah, I see what's he was talking about." Carcinogen said. "It's all fallin' apart, hero. But don't worry. I'll make sure to take de' process and see if I can't _speed it up."_

Savior was jumping backwards before the original toxin cloud reformed, the gas recreating itself in the space of a second and surging across the ground towards him. Carcinogen took a moment to make a gun-motion with his pointed fingers before he exhaled an even darker mass of poison, the whole ground before him vanishing beneath a wide cone of smoke. Savior compensated by taking to the air again-

Just in time for a Boojum to direct a sonic blast right into the base of his spine. Savior spun through the air like a top, yelling in pain, but he kept his head and whirled around, lashing out a Shimmer strand and slicing the small robot in half. More Shimmer lines dove back and dug into the ground, the energy talent trying to shrug off the intense probing burn of Carcinogen's power.

"You just not listen'n." Carcinogen said, and thrust up his right hand as he slapped his forearm with his left. The Jamaican's fist broke off his body like it was driven by a rocket, the dark flesh turning a light green color as it streaked towards the Titan. Savior's instincts won out over his training, and he lashed at the fist in turn.

A bad move, as the appendage turned projectile exploded, the light green gas enveloping Savior and driving him backwards. Unable to hold him any more, the Shimmer lines gave up the ghost and retreated from the acidic cloud below. Savior's fall carried him clear of said cloud, but the heavy impact he made against the island's rocky body was little comfort.

The green mass swirled up and towards Carcinogen as he walked forward, the mist compacting and reforming into his hand while he strolled towards the Titan.

"What you do, is you t'ink too much. Why da Lord got to you. Me, I think just enough. Proof of da puddin' in da' eatin', ya know?" Carcinogen said, stopping several feet distant. Savior could not reply; his whole body felt numb, like he was being squeezed by a giant icy hand. The Genocide member hadn't just knocked him out of the air. He'd fired another mix of poison gas, some kind of paralyzing/tranquilizer mix. A part of Noel's mind idly wondered why the Jamaican had picked the unwieldy name of Carcinogen rather than something more fitting, like Pollution. Then again, with how much of a control freak the Lord was, he'd probably picked out the name for some stupid reason only he understood.

Carcinogen, to his credit, actually did glance around again before returning his gaze to the Titan before him. More dark emerald gas began leaking from his hands.

"So then…eh." Carcinogen said, unable to think of anything else snappy to say. He settled for bathing Savior in supremely-caustic smoke, planning to melt his dissolving corpse right into the sea.

The rock barrier exploded out of the ground so roughly it nearly took Savior's head off before Carcinogen's attack could. Despite that, the rock did an admirable job stopping the acidic plume, at least for the two seconds Savior stared before the Shimmer pulled him away. Carcinogen got the same amount of time to react before the Starbolt flew into him from the side, the explosion consuming him completely.

"Am I allowed to express my opinion?" Starfire said, floating down; the Jamaican had tried to scout for possible ambushes, but you had to get up pretty early in the morning to catch the battle-honed alien with a brief 180-degree glimpse. "You yourself know little. And given who you have chosen to side with, you will learn less."

The lance of green smoke flew out of the darker, more traditional dust and dirt cloud, but Starfire was already dodging before it emerged. Carcinogen lunged out of the dust, his body a twisted merge of flesh and green gas that settled back into his normal form, one hand out as he filled the sky with poison, trying to drive Starfire to ground. Instead, she just flew higher, another Starbolt shining down and detonating right on top of Carcinogen, blowing him to wispy clouds once more.

Savior pulled himself to his feet as this happened, before glancing to the side. Terra floated there, a mass of rocks around her.

"…nice work." Savior said. _Good thing you figured out how to subvert the Lord's island machinations enough to shield me._

"Yes." _Yes, wouldn't that have been a great loss if I'd failed._

The worst part was, Savior couldn't find any reason to disagree with the clear thought behind the word. He doubted anyone sane could have.

He had worse things to disagree with, though. Carcinogen had pulled himself back together again, shrugging off the Starbolt almost as soon as it had blown him up. Savior had a feeling that, after that demonstration, there wasn't going to be a sudden dip into shoddy workmanship.

"Okay, that's enough out of alla you." Carcinogen said, green sheets of mist erupting from his body. _"TIME TO TEACH YOU SOME RESPECT."_

* * *

Marissa Mori was too dedicated to her job to sit back and watch the fights, but by the nature of her own assistance, she was gleaning as much from the events playing out on her monitors as any normal observer. At the moment, she was watching Terra hammer a pillar of rock into Carcinogen, immediately followed by another Starbolt. Carcinogen pulled himself from the blast and countered with his own, aiming for Terra and driving her away. Marissa took the time to direct two Mock Tanks to fire at Savior, but the Titan had seen her coming and smashed both robots. Or, as it turned out, he smashed one. The second he grabbed up with his power, and before Marissa could free it Savior thrust the energy lines across the battlefield and placed the robot directly above Carcinogen. Starfire whirled in and unleashed her eye beams, melting the robot to slag within seconds, the molten metal falling onto Carcinogen's form in a rain of fire. Carcinogen grimaced under the scoria, but he didn't stop attacking, waving his hand and sending an eruption of corrosive gas exploding along the ground towards Savior. When Terra flew back in and hammered Carcinogen with more rocks, all she managed to do was knock the liquefied metal off of the villain; he favored her with a smirk and then fired another lance of destroying mist at the girl's head.

Marissa changed cameras, checking if Hyperthermia needed reinforcements (the girl hadn't exactly thrilled Marissa with her tactics, or lack thereof) against Gauntlet and Scalpel, who had remained in their team-up against the girl. The blonde Titan had formed a dense ball of golden Gauntlet energy that Scalpel proceeded to strike with his war hammer, sending the orb flying forward with more momentum than Gauntlet could muster on his own. Unfortunately, Hyperthermia made up for in reflexes what she lacked in general brain power, and every time the ball-on-a-string flew towards her she blasted it with intense heat. It didn't affect the orb, but the meta was throwing out heat wily-nily every time she countered, causing Rob to lose his concentration and recoil, instinctively drawing the energy back to protect him instead of striking his enemy. He and the alien had repeatedly dashed to a new position and tried the move again, only for Hyperthermia to be quick on the draw in turn.

"Son of a…you all right Nigel?" Gauntlet asked after his latest failure.

"It's open flames that are the bane…boiling I can take. Within reason." Scalpel said. "How about you, watersack?"

"I'm feeling a bit more sack than water." Gauntlet said, before Hyperthermia hurled a ball of heat near the pair. It missed completely, but Gauntlet's taunt turned into a curse when it hit the ground nearby and pelted the two with rock shards; the attack had acted both like a bomb and like a heat expansion from hell. Gauntlet winced as he touched a sore spot, wondering if there was a way to check the 'charge' of Cyborg's protective shields and whether it was running low or not. At least he didn't have to worry about a second counter-attack: Hyperthermia was too busy clapping her hands and skipping in place, delighted at her offense being effective.

"It's a good thing she's not a professional or we'd probably already be dead." Gauntlet said.

"I still want to chop her head off."

"That might be a bit much." Gauntlet said, before noticing that Hyperthermia seemed to be concentrating, holding out her hand towards him like she was cupping his head.

A moment later, Gauntlet's hair was on fire.

"SUNNNAVVVAAAA….!" Gauntlet yelled, flailing at his scalp with hands and gauntlet power, even as Hyperthermia laughed in delight. The fire was snuffed out as quickly as it had started, doing little actual damage to Rob's head, but that fact didn't really register with the Titan.

"Good thing you didn't use hair gel today." Scalpel said.

"Scalpel, don't chop her head off, KICK IT OFF. IT WILL HURT MORE." Gauntlet snarled. Scalpel was moving before Rob could even finish his sentence, taking advantage of Hyperthermia laughing at Rob. He didn't actually kick, he just swung his hammer at the girl. Despite her eyes being closed due to her laughing, somehow she knew he was coming, the air flaring around her as she flew up into the sky, Nigel flying beneath her feet.

Gauntlet, to his credit, resisted yelling something at his enemy and just fired out a Gauntlet fist. With a small shriek, Hyperthermia dodged to the side.

Scalpel pulled out the scimitar from within his cloak and hurled it less than a second later. Upon some later reflection, Gauntlet found it frankly terrifying the alien could estimate his choice of moves that well. The blade spun towards the back of the girl.

She proceeded to spin out of the way without even glancing behind herself. Gauntlet goggled for a moment. How the HELL?

"Neener neener!" Hyperthermia taunted, sticking out her tongue and pulling down the flap of one eye.

She crashed into the cliffside a moment later, falling to its base with another shriek.

"DON'T LET UP!" Gauntlet said, a spare thread of golden power grabbing the scimitar Scalpel had thrown and tossing it back at him even as Rob dashed towards where his opponent had fallen. Leaping, he formed another giant fist and lashed it out towards the girl, the bottom of the cliff face exploding outward in dust from the impact.

Hyperthermia spun up from the cloud a second later, looking very pleased with herself.

"Oh siddleficks." Gauntlet said, and then Hyperthermia thrust out her hands, pointing them at Gauntlet like arrows, lances of vaporizing heat flying at him.

Marissa stopped watching then. Kyleona seemed to have things in hand, much to her surprise (then again, the master had picked, empowered, and trained her for a reason, Marissa should always mind that). She turned to the third and last battle, Beast Boy still wreathed in Raven's black power as he punched and kicked at Aguardiente as an orangutan. Every time Aguardiente blasted him back with water, Raven 'swung' Beast Boy right back into the mix. Marissa immediately summoned as many units as she could and threw them at Raven, but to her immediate dismay, Raven partly turned away from her current fight and, with one hand, began defending herself even as she continued to assist Beast Boy. To make matters worse, a combination of Birdarangs and gunshots from the last two Titans cut into the robots assaulting Raven from their flank. When Marissa directed more Haber-Dashers and Snarks to attack those two, they split up before she could pin them down and took to the smoke and shadows of the fight. When Marissa pin-pointed Robin's position and aimed a Tweedle at him, the Teen Wonder hurled his bo at a laser-precise angle that slammed into the robot and deflected it, directing her bomb into her own troops. The only reason it didn't explode was because Marissa immediately hit the kill switch. Then Robin hurled an explosive disc into the Tweedle's new position, and her fast reaction time swiftly became moot.

"_**Miss Mori…"**_

"Yes sir?' Marissa said, her head snapping up from the screens she'd been typing at.

"_**Give me a report of the situation outside."**_

"…I would consider it a standstill, sir."

"…_**And what say you about the immediate future of this standstill, Miss Mori?"**_

"Um…it's probably not a good time to make an assessment, sir. This is the opening moments of their first fight. History tends to favor the aggressive side in these matters." Marissa said, trying to keep her face focused on her computer readouts.

"…_**Call your machines back."**_

"Sir?"

"_**Just back for a moment. Do what you can to make the retreat less obvious."**_

"…Yes sir." Marissa said, as she began to type.

"_**One more thing."**_

Marissa heard the floor cracking next to her, and her eyes jerked to the noise. The orb rose up from beneath the ground, fused to a black crystal pillar, the imprint of a small hand on it.

"_**I cannot split my attention enough to perform this action, Miss Mori. On my command, put your hand on the indentation."**_

"Yes sir." Marissa said, speeding up her typing.

* * *

"Your vermin aspect continues to shine, doesn't it Titans…" The Lord said to himself, He could not move his hands; in fact he couldn't move any part of his body, every single part of him covered with pulsing violet runes. The Zelmotta Arcana floated near him, its faded writings nearly illegible from the passage of time. Before him, his work loomed.

"Then again, I expected nothing less."

The Lord's dancing cloaks coiled before erupting outward and impaling itself into the walls. The Lord had crafted Etemenanki, and the structure was as much as part of him as the many blades he wielded. Through it, the Lord directed his power. Through Marissa's eyes, he saw his targets.

"_Neither should you._"

Marissa's withdrawal of her robots went smoothly, save for the occasional straggler. To be fair to one of them, it was because Morgue shot it in the back.

The Haber-Dasher turned around, immediately locking onto the larger girl and making a beeline directly towards her. Marissa had designed the robot's wire-forms well: the robot had already compensated for the severed and damaged wires and went after Morgue with virtually no lost mobility. The average solder might have panicked.

Morgue just took two seconds to observe the twisting, distorting wires, then lined up another shot and promptly put a concentrated plasma blast directly through one of its joints. Though to be fair to the average soldier, the super heroine had made a point to study every robot she came across throughout the whole fight.

The Haber-Dasher didn't break down after one shot either, immediately shifting its weight and continuing towards Morgue full-bore. Morgue responded by blowing out another joint, and then a third. The Haber-Dasher switched from a running motion to a tumbleweed-like one, closing the distance to less than ten feet. Before Morgue could fire again, the robot hurled its bladed staff at her. Morgue threw herself backwards, the weapon just barely missing her head…

The Haber-Dasher plowed into her, knocking her to the ground and pinning her gun arm down, simultaneously lancing out more wires and trying to impale the girl through the throat. When her armor resisted the stab, the Haber-Dasher just put even more pressure on the blow, looking to crush Morgue's windpipe. In the old days, one of the Titans would have come to save her, and in fact Robin had seen the tackle and was already drawing a Birdarang.

However, the Haber-Dasher had neglected to pin down Morgue's other arm. It didn't have a weapon.

Then Morgue's right hand turned into three bats, the small mammals escaping from the robot's wires before it could compensate, taking Sophie's gun with her and bringing it to her other hand. Raising it, Morgue blew the construct's head apart, cool as a cucumber.

"I hate you grabby types." Morgue said, shoving the robot off and getting up, shooting it once more to be certain.

The Birdarang blew up the nearby Flutter-Bye a moment before Morgue noticed it. Robin, making himself useful after all. With a gesture, Morgue sent the same three bats she'd summoned a moment ago off, the flying creatures grabbing up Robin's nearby staff to return to him. Morgue took a second to check the power cell for her non-projectile weapon before looking around. Strange, you'd think there would be more robots…

…why _weren't_ there more robots…

It only took Sophie a few seconds to figure it out. It helped that, lacking an attacker, she noticed what none of the other Titans did. Even Robin, who was running to help Gauntlet and Scalpel, missed the sign.

Raven was still serving as an 'equipper' to Beast Boy, and she, perhaps, made the greatest oversight. Morgue compensated though, dissolving into a bat swarm and immediately flying nearby, hoping she would be fast enough. In the meantime, Raven was pulling a now-tiger Beast Boy back to her side. The changeling had hammered at Aguardiente with ten different animal forms, and he'd shrugged them all off.

"Almost starting to miss Met." Beast Boy said.

"He could have been-"

"Raven! Look!" Morgue yelled, interrupting the sorceress. Raven looked at the mortician, who immediately pointed off to her flank. Raven promptly looked there instead.

Her throat went dry at the sight of the suddenly-concentrated arcs of energy that had begun building around the summits of the Lord's tower. How had she not noticed that? By Azar, how had she not FELT it…

Because he didn't want her to.

He knew her too well.

In the end, all he did was give her a second to react.

"**EVERYONE LOOK OUT TOWER ATTACK!"**

The thought did not so much slam into the Titans' heads as it skipped across their thoughts and reflexes, all of the young heroes immediately stopping what they were doing and dis-engaging from Genocide and the robots. Their gaze turned towards Etemenanki in time for the arcs to immediately and violently converge, a skyscraper sized lance of black energy firing from its warped structure directly towards the battle. Inside Etemennaki's depths, Marissa recoiled from her 'handprint trigger' like it had burned her, her eyes as wide as saucers as the blast tore across all her screens.

Raven dearly wanted to pull her friends to safety, but she had no time. All she had was the faith that they could get themselves to safety, and did so with herself. The midnight blade tore across the battlefield, explosions erupting in its wake, burning shards of rock and ash pelting Raven. She said another small blessing for her protections: this hurt already, but she'd really have been in a bad way without them. She and Beast Boy…

BEAST BOY!

She'd been carrying him, reacting on instinct when she dodged the blast. Somewhere along the way, she'd lost him. She could still sense him, somewhere nearby, but beyond that he was gone. How had…

_Because why settle for blocking her ability to sense the attack coming when he could make it disrupt her power too? No wonder that debris had hurt: it had circumnavigated her own shields, leaving Cyborg's to take up the brunt of it._

For a second, Raven almost threw all caution and sense to the wind and teleported to the tower, ready and willing to take on the Lord then and there. She stopped herself just in time, cool logic overriding her emotion.

_He just tipped his hand on an improvement he made. You can render it worthless now. The fight's still here._

Raven looked at the distant tower. It wasn't charging a second blast, and Raven would make sure that if it did, the Lord wouldn't be blocking her.

_For now, finish it._

The rage did not fully vanish though, still clawing at the back of Raven's head. For now, Raven dismissed it, looking for Beast Boy or whatever Genocide member was unfortunate enough to cross her path first.

* * *

Gauntlet wasn't sure what happened to his other enemies. All he did was use the Gauntlet to shield himself and throw himself sideways, his eyes still locked on Hyperthermia. She was far slower on the uptake, and turned around just as the ebony blaze engulfed her, her scream swallowed even as it began.

"Oh, this better not be a trick." Gauntlet said.

"Did she strike you as smart enough to perform that kind of deception?" Scalpel asked, after thudding down next to Gauntlet from his return-to-attack-range leap.

"The Lord's involved. For all I know, he's using her as a meat puppet right now, and HE'S smart enough to think like that."

The sound of the sneeze from the fading cloud of dust was not what Gauntlet expected to hear, even as Hyperthermia appeared again. Gauntlet narrowed his eyes; not only was she unharmed, but she was standing on a small circle of untouched rock. The vaporizing, explosive blast had passed over her like she wasn't there.

"…da hell?" Hyperthermia said, looking around. "…wow."

"Terra's still on the fritz, right?" Gauntlet said.

"More or less."

"Then this may be a miracle."

"Or the Lord sparing his pawns." Robin said, emerging from the shadows to Gauntlet's other side.

"Awwwww! How did that miss you?" Hyperthermia said, seeing the three.

"Clean living." Gauntlet said, forming another massive yellow fist.

"Huh?"

Robin didn't bother replying, instead hurling a Birdarang at the woman. It vaporized a foot from her.

"And now she's emitting enough heat to destroy specially treated metal, while somehow completely negating the effects of convection." Scalpel said. "I don't think it would be good for us to get close to her."

"I can hear you, you know!" Hyperthermia said. The three men stared.

"What part of heat powers include SUPER HEARING?" Gauntlet yelled.

"They don't! I just hear good!" Hyperthermia said, tapping her head. "So, don't want to get close, do you?"

"Nope, can't say I care much for the idea." Gauntlet said, wincing inwardly. No wonder she'd pulled that insane scimitar dodge earlier. She'd somehow heard the nearly silent weapon.

"TOO BAD!" Hyperthermia said, thrusting her hands forward. Unfortunately, the angle was wrong, and she ended up throwing herself backwards as she blasted the ground, the immediate rock burning away beneath her fall as she landed with a cry.

"Wow. Just wow." Gauntlet said. "Every time she finds herself on the cusp of competence, she shoots herself in the foot. I don't know whether to be relieved or alarmed."

"Cautious is best, Gauntlet. The Lord must have picked her for a reason." Robin said.

"Not a combat related reason, from the looks of it."

The blast of heat burned up from the rock to Gauntlet's immediate left, immediately vaporizing the sweat off his face. Hyperthermia continued slamming her hands into the ground, sending more blasts of destroying power tearing up amongst the three Titans. Gauntlet threw himself into Scalpel and rolled with him, aided by the Gauntlet, before he picked up a chunk of rock and hurled it at the woman.

He just hit more rock: Hyperthermia was gone.

"AIR!" Robin yelled, and Gauntlet looked up to see Hyperthermia hovering 40 feet in the air, holding her hands out as heat shimmered around her.

"I'm really getting the hang of this!" Hyperthermia said with delight, and then flipped in the air and thrust out her arms, blazing towards the three as a missile.

"Oh goody." Gauntlet sighed, and then threw himself backwards again.

* * *

There were all sorts of words you didn't want to think about in the midst of a fight. Words like _ineffectual_ (every time he or one of his two teammates hit Carcinogen, the attack just went right through him or briefly dispersed him) or _complications _(Carcinogen had kept filling the air, and by extent the ground, with poisonous, destructive clouds of contaminants, and while both Terra and Starfire had air filters like Savior, they didn't have Shimmer armor to keep said filter from melting, or to protect their eyes. True, Starfire could hold her breath an incredibly long time if she had to, but that didn't help when the poison was trying to melt your skin at the same time as your lungs) or _dismal_ (their chances if things didn't turn around).

Another bad word, maybe even worse, was _ambush._

Savior had no idea where his allies or enemies had gone. He'd been given the command to move, and he moved, throwing himself across the battlefield to avoid the Lord's cleaving strike. He didn't have much luck on the landing; he touched down near another rocky protrusion which collapsed under the Lord's assault, burying Savior under tons of crushing stone.

A few seconds after the rocks settled, Shimmer lines tore out from beneath it, shoving the stained boulders aside. Savior emerged, dirty but relatively unhurt. He counted himself lucky in that regard. Training with a geokinetic was good practice for buried alive situations.

_Not to mention she might just leave you there to suffocate on your own, wouldn't she?_

Savior ignored the voice and its constant, boring attempt to get into his head. Well, it was already in his head…but it wasn't getting any further. He pulled himself up on the part of the escarpment that hadn't collapsed, scanning the island's landscape. The smoking scar the Lord had cut (shades of the Sahara) made this considerably more difficult, but even with a coating of dust and soot, Beast Boy stood out like a sore thumb.

Savior's white hair, even dirty, was a similarly strong target, and the sound of servos whirring into action made Savior jerk around a second before the Flutter-Bye opened fire. Bullets tore into the ground around Savior, a few deflecting off his personal shield. Savior fell to one knee, Shimmer lines weaving into a secondary shield.

Savior's retaliation had a notable two second pause, before Shimmer lines flew out from behind the shield, seizing the Flutter-Bye and turning the robot (and its gun) on the Mock Tank that had trundled up on Savior's flank. The Mock Tank, in a credit to its design, immediately returned fire on the Flutter-Bye, striking it dead center. Savior promptly drove the flying robot into the tank robot, both of them exploding as Savior whirled around. He then lashed out with multiple Shimmer blades, slicing the Haber-Dasher coming up behind him to bits. Knowing your surroundings never failed to be a beneficial move, especially in the fog of war.

"How's THAT, then?" Savior growled to himself, raining a few hammer blows on the Haber-Dasher to finish it off. "Haven't lost THAT, have I? How unfortunate! You know, something occurs to me! Maybe I did lose a lot, but I can damn sure _TAKE IT ALL BACK!"_

Turning back to where he'd spotted Beast Boy, Savior watched as his teammate climbed up over a shard of rock as a monkey. Savior raised a hand, trying to get his attention…

Then another flash of green caught his attention. A shifting mass of green smoke, coming up from behind him. Savior immediately forgot about yelling at Beast Boy and went for his communicator. Maybe he didn't have the time to directly call him over it, but he could still sent Gar an emergency signal and get him on his guard-!

To Savior's credit, he took another moment to look around even as he pulled out the device. To Marissa Mori's credit, the Boojum shot it out of his hand the split second he laid eyes on it.

"FUCK-!" Savior yelled, before three more Boojums joined the four and opened fire, intense sonic blasts driving into Savior's body and making him stagger back. Rather than retaliate, Savior turned and leapt into the air.

He barely caught sight of the Tweedle bomb as it flew in. Lacking any better choice, Savior lashed it with the Shimmer and was promptly hammered into the ground by the explosion. His back wrenched painfully, and for a few seconds Savior was uncertain if he'd felt a few ribs crack.

Then the Boojums were there, having swiftly followed to return fire. Savior rolled onto his side and lashed out with Shimmer strands, but the small, quick robots dodged away from his attacks.

"I don't have _TIME _for-UARGH!" Savior cried out as he tried to get up and promptly got hammered in the side by another Mock Tank's concussive blast. Falling to his knees, his head swimming, Savior tried to get his bearings and get air into his lungs. He needed to shout a warning…

Ironically, Beast Boy had spotted Savior when the Tweedle had blown him into the ground, and had begun rushing to help _him…_a rush that was cut off by a sudden wall of blackish smoke, erupting from the ground in front of Beast Boy and driving him back. Chuckling to himself, Carcinogen stepped from his acidic fog, traces of the smoke drifting off his body.

"Hello boy. Nice to make your acquaintance." Carcinogen said. Beast Boy, having returned to human form, growled in a way that was more appropriate to one of his many other forms.

"Get out of my way."

"Make me."

Beast Boy immediately became a gorilla, tearing a piece of rock out of the ground and hurling it at Carcinogen. The Jamaican blew it to pieces in mid-air even as he cracked up laughing; if that rock-controlling girl hadn't been able to make this work on him, what the hell did the little green man expect?

Carcinogen got his answer as the rock finished breaking apart, exposing Beast Boy charging directly at him. Specifically, as a _pachycephalosarus._

The impact of 25 inches of solid, dense bone knocked Carcinogen right off his feet. It also sent Beast Boy reeling away, shaking his head wildly as the gas erupting from the impact seared into his eyes and nose. Beast Boy staggered a few steps before returning to his human form, coughing and clawing at his watering eyes. The dark chuckle off to his side didn't improve his mood, the changeling managing to regain enough vision to turn and glare at the recovered Genocide member.

"Still want a piece 'o me?" Carcinogen said. "You're lookin' a bit…green around de gills."

Beast Boy snorted, and then in a swirl of green, transformed into a snake. Specifically, a gigantic, man-sized snake. Carcinogen smiled wickedly at the idiocy; after that little display, the boy was trying some kind of anaconda shit?

Carcinogen was, like most things in his life, wrong, as Beast Boy reared back and sprayed his own poison from his mouth, the venom striking Carcinogen directly in the eyes and causing him to rear back, yelling as it burned him. The Jamaican had yet to fully unlock the extended effects of his abilities, such as the ability to _instantly _neutralize poison. Beast Boy, on the other hand, had learned a lot of tricks for his trade. Including the ability to become a Mozambique spitting cobra that was ten times the size of the usual snake, with ten times the venom delivery.

Of course, there were his usual tricks too. Like turning into another gorilla, picking up another rock, and throwing it directly into Carcinogen before he could recover. The Genocide member reformed from the rock strike, his amusement having turned to intense rage.

"And you look like you're seeing Red." Beast Boy said, before making a taunting gesture.

Savior, unfortunately, had no idea that Beast Boy had turned things around. In between Carcinogen's obscuring cloud and the ceaseless robot attacks, his attention was pretty much devoted to trying not to die. Pinned down and unable to escape, Savior had tried to repeat the burrowing trick he'd pulled with Carcinogen earlier, only to discover he was on a shelf of far denser rock. Forming shields didn't work; the small robots just immediately darted to a new opening and resumed firing, and Savior was unable to spear and lash the tiny robots down faster than they could summon reinforcements.

"Little…bastard…nerg!" Savior grunted as his latest attempt to get up failed. Crossing his arms at the wrists, Savior finally went full-tilt with his defense and formed a Shimmer cocoon around himself. He couldn't see out of it, but his talent could still carry him along the ground until-

Savior's blindness came back to bite him far sooner than he'd predicted, as a single Snark positioned itself and then turned on its laser blaster full bore. Pain exploded through Savior's body, the Snark carving through his protection like a hot knife through butter. The Shimmer hated blades, and there was no finer blade, in the natural world, then a super-concentrated beam of light. In reality, Savior would have been better off taking the shot directly; his armor and his added shield would have taken the brunt of the attack. Now, wracked with pain, he lay helpless on the ground, exposed.

A lash of torment crossed her mind. Familiar torment. Raven stopped in mid-air and turned, her heart leaping into her mouth…

The Snark exploded in the moment before it could re-calibrate its laser. A couple of its partner robots swiftly followed, plasma blasts blowing them out of the sky. The remaining Wonderland mechs immediately went into defensive maneuvers, veering to dodge further shots and return fire. Freed from his predicament, Savior clamped down on his pain and moved, retracting the Shimmer into himself and springing behind another rock. Pulling himself up onto it, Savior looked to lend a hand.

Morgue blew the last robot out of the air when Savior was halfway up the rock. Savior blinked, staring at his distant ally, perched on another black rock nearby. Morgue reloaded her energy weapon's power cell and returned the gaze.

Then she waved said gun at Savior in a chiding fashion. _Making me do all the work, Collins. Shame on you._

Raven, across the island, saw this in turn. She had her own thoughts on the matter. Specifically, of a dark hotel room, the events that had transpired there, and the exact opposite of such events that had just played out before her.

The truth of it.

Raven turned and resumed her flight. Neither of them needed her.

Morgue might have disagreed, as a pair of Flutter-Byes zoomed in and opened fire. Dropping down from her exposed roost, Morgue returned fire, and Savior finally managed to lend a proper hand by sending out a Shimmer whip, knocking one of the Flutter-Byes askew.

It was all he managed before he caught the motion at the corner of his eye. Whirling, he deflected the stabbing blade of the Haber-Dasher at the last second, the impact knocking him off his own rock, the Titan and robot tumbling down and across the immediate area in a tornado of metal and white. Wires lashed and tore at Savior, but in this situation the Titan could give far more than he had to take, the Shimmer ensnarling itself through the Haber-Dasher's body. The two bounced one last time before Savior whirled the robot beneath him and slammed it to the ground, the white energies tearing the robot into pieces with one immense scattering yank.

"Piece of _**JUNK.**_" Savior spat. His cart wheeling Shimmer-leap allowed him to dodge the blasts fired by the Marchares, and a few more kept him out of the way of the new Haber-Dashers that tried to stab him in turn. His feet dragged along the ground as he stopped himself, a web of lines dancing from his back.

"Oh, I'm sorry. Did you not hear me?" Savior said, Shimmer-blades erupting from his arms. "Because I say I've got a fair point."_**  
**_

* * *

It was somewhat fortunate Raven had left her two teammates 'behind'. Had she not turned back around, she would have risked ambush with the Genocide member she'd immediately run into, once more.

"Hello again." Aguardiente said, standing on his pillar of water, his cloaks flapping around him amidst a constant spray of vapor. "So then…I see you finally did away with your human shield. Animal shield. Whichever."

Raven's own cloaks flowed around her, her hands charged with dark energy. She inhaled sharply through her nose, dark eyes locked onto the shadows beneath the Genocide member's hood. Peering into what lay beneath.

It was sad, sometimes, how a life could be fit into a few seconds.

"…Nothing you do will bring them back." Raven said. If Aguardiente had a reaction to this proclamation, he did not show it. "Your whole life has been wasted on that impossibility, Brody Whelan."

"Don't try to manipulate me, young lady. I've strangled better at it than you."

"You _KNOW_ that it's true. Killing that man changed nothing. Acting as the Lord's slave will change NOTHING. The answers are not in the world, Whelan. The world doesn't give a damn. It's cold and hard and empty. The only answers are in you. The only way-"

Raven's dark powers wove before her, intercepting the blast of boiling water at the last second.

"And there is nothing _you_ can do to change my mind, young lady." Aguardiente said.

"YOU SPENT YOUR WHOLE LIFE DOING THIS! Even NOW, this is all you want?" Raven said.

"Some things change. A lot of things don't. World's also big. Lots to do. In it. To it. All that really appeals to me, in the end."

"…you're pathetic."

"I call it realistic." Aguardiente said, and thrust up his arms. Water exploded from beneath Raven, pluming up into the sky before turning into two crushing, burning orbs. Raven's eyes flicked to the side as the twin spheres barreled towards her…

The rock walls stopped the spheres dead. Twin star bolts blew the constructs apart before they could do much more than make initial impact.

"You poor souls so love that word…" Starfire said, floating down near Raven. "How sad it so rarely means what you want it to mean."

Terra didn't add to the discussion. She just smashed a giant rock fist directly on top of Aguardiente's head. The villain vanished beneath the blow, his water pillar faltering in turn, before it abruptly began drilling up against the rock fist with ten times its previous strength.

Terra was smart enough to deflect her own rock shards away from her when the construct exploded, but that did nothing to help with the jet of burning water that followed immediately on the fist's heels. The black power shield, however, stopped it in its tracks.

The water immediately curved around the shield and went for Terra, who threw her transport- rock into a sharp sideways dodge. Aguardiente reformed on his water pillar, but his further attempts to chase Terra down ceased when Starfire hurled several more Starbolts. The explosions blew him and his tower to scattered pieces, only for him, and it, to reform in two seconds and lash out with his arm, a blade of water tearing across the sky that Starfire dodged…which prompted Aguardiente to slam his other hand into his liquid weapon and cause it to explode, hammering the alien with dozens of water droplets with the impact of hailstones.

Raven's own blade pierced Aguardiente's chest, her dark power flowing into his body as the sorceress fought to undo the Lord's work. Cold needles rammed into her head, and she recoiled with a hiss. The bastard had done his homework. Raven, in theory, could shut down the magically crafted metagenes he'd implanted in the three members of Genocide, but not without the process being fatal to them. Aguardiente did not share Raven's mercy, lashing upward with a hand. The ground shattered beneath Raven, and a clawed hand of water roared up beneath her. Raven's black shield closed around her a heartbeat before the hand did, but it did little to help her as she was slammed against the ground so hard the whole island seemed to shake. Stunned, Raven was promptly hurled into another rock face, carving a scar across it before she came to a stop.

"You still fail to impress me." Aguardiente said.

Terra's attack hit the Genocide member out of nowhere, the box of dirt surging up and snapping closed on him before he could even realize it was there.

No. Not dirt. Sand.

Terra floated up level with her box, her eyes blazing gold. She said nothing, instead clenching her fingers and keeping her trap as dense as possible. She felt the creature's watery form tearing through it, trying to find an escape; Terra delayed it as long as possible. That was only five seconds at most, but when Aguardiente bored his form out of the sand box he found he was no longer above his water pillar.

The fall was just high enough to keep him from summoning another one. He landed with a strange wet snapping noise that sounded like someone firing a gunshot underwater.

Terra followed him straight down a second later, the rock pillar she'd ripped from the sea floor at the same time she'd collected her sand crashing down on his body like a ton of bricks. At least that was her intention: the water that erupted around Aguardiente's form closed over him like a shield, stopping the attack in its tracks. Screaming in frustration, Terra repeatedly slammed the rock down on the shield, Aguardiente responded by morphing the shield into a hand and slapping the multi-ton rock away like a toy, even as he thrust out his own hand and sent a third outward, grabbing Terra by the throat.

"That….actually hurt." Aguardiente said, and beneath his hood Terra saw a brief flash of exposed white teeth.

Then the water gripping her throat rose up to encase her whole head.

"Some people say downing's the worst way to die. Others say burning. I say, WHY CHOOSE?" Aguardiente said, and immediately began boiling the water encased around Terra's head. While Terra immediately fought back, stones hurling themselves at the Genocide member even while the geokinetic clawed at the water trapped around her head, the projectiles just went through him. Terra had hoped that by drawing water off Aguardiente's main body, she could weaken him enough to finish this. Now the shoe was on the other foot…

Raven's left hand cut off Aguardiente's stream of water as she dashed between the two. Immediately after that, her right hand backhanded Aguardiente with a thundering lash of ebony power. Aguardiente staggered, his face deforming under the blow, but he immediately spun and retaliated with a water-bludgeon that hit Raven so hard the ground cracked beneath her. Raven was again tossed through the air by the blast, but she didn't go alone, her dark energies dragging a gasping Terra along with her.

"Oh. That's how it's going to be, is it?" Aguardiente said. Starfire gave him the answer he didn't need by blowing him up with another Starbolt, and then swooping in and unleashing the full fury of her eye lasers on his reforming body. The water began to boil away, but more flowed up from the ground beneath him, replenishing his essence. Though Starfire couldn't see his face, she knew he was sneering at her through body language alone. She flew backwards and spun rapidly, dodging the blades of water Aguardiente hurled at her, before the Genocide member rose up on another pillar. Starfire stopped and turned around, black shadows blooming near her as Raven returned with Terra, a quick heal having fixed the burns on her face before they could start.

"Fine by me." Aguardiente said, and lashed out with more liquid blades. Raven put up another shield…

"It's a feint!" Terra said.

Raven glanced towards the woman, and then the ground exploded beneath Aguardiente, a hole a hundred feet in radius having been chewed out of the island by water boring up from the caves beneath it. Multitudinous heads rose up from the formed pool, the hydra reborn in H20.

"You may want to get more of your friends." Aguardiente said, and then the heads tore towards the three.

* * *

_La Voix_ hadn't had much flora by its design: the only exception, and the last holdout of life before the whole island had ended up dead rock, was on its southwest end. A small meteor impact millions of years ago had left an angled crater there, and within it at some point, a forest had grown. Who knows when, and how long it had struggled on, but at some point in recent history it succumbed as well, leaving nothing but a copse of dead, brittle trees, a mass tombstone for the tragic inevitability of some seeds.

Unfortunately, the angle of its approach made the crater sneak up on you if you were fleeing backwards, on foot, away from a metahuman's endless release of deadly heat.

"WHOA!" Gauntlet said, putting on the brakes before he leapt backwards. "Robin, we have a problem!"

"What is it?" Robin said, before answering his own question. "Oh."

"What do we do, go around?"

Heat slammed into Robin's body, his hair dancing from the draft.. A moment later Scalpel finished his dragging impact from the backwards leap he had done.

"That didn't work either." Scalpel said. The three had, taking into account Hyperthermia's intense heat barrier, tried to 'burn it out' by pelting the girl with constant stone projectiles. It hadn't worked, so Scalpel had done one better and tried to collapse a cliff face on her, a trick he'd said had 'worked great earlier'. This time, it just resulted in Hyperthermia floating out of a nearly-perfect circle in the debris, all of the rock having been blasted to nothing before it could touch her. Sending out literal 'heat waves' in retaliation, their shimmering passage barely detectable until the rock started smoking, had forced the three into the retreat that had just abruptly ended.

"…This is a bad place to be." Robin said, looking down at the dead forest.

"The whole island's a bad place to be! But yes, we should run from this particular spot. Quickly." Gauntlet said.

A blast of deeper heat heralded their enemy's arrival, as Hyperthermia flew/floated in, her whole outfit rippling from the energies.

"Awwww…running away boys? Why? I don't bite." Hyperthermia said, putting a finger on the edge of her mouth and giving them a coy look. The past three minutes of the girl literally atomizing anything they threw at her had done a great deal for her confidence.

Gauntlet's attempt to punch it out of her failed, and the heat-manipulator thrust out her arm, a shimmering wall rising up before the three.

"No longer an OPTION!" Scalpel said, grabbing Robin and whirling around to leap down into the forest. Gauntlet only waited for the alien to actually grab Tim before he also bugged out, leaping off the cliff face before the heat boiled him alive.

The trees were long-dead and dry as a bone, but it still wasn't much fun plowing down through them. Gauntlet hit the ground and did two rolls before flipping up to his feet. Scalpel had landed nearby, and another short leap brought them back together.

"I'm going to be finding splinters for weeks." Gauntlet said. Robin did not reply, his head darting around. "What do we do?"

"We ru-" Robin began, before Hyperthermia dropped down nearby, the usual blast of heat accompanying her. It was right about then that Gauntlet put a few things together.

Like the dead, dry wood he'd just whacked his way through to land. Along with the fact they were fighting someone who controlled HEAT.

"Crud." Gauntlet said. Heat was bad. A giant fire was, in a way, worse. No one had ever suffocated on a heat wave.

"Is she smart enough to realize that?" Scalpel said, having come to the same conclusion.

"Smart enough to realize what?" Hyperthermia said. "…Ohhhhh. Right. Forest. Wood. Burn."

Hyperthermia reached into the pockets inside her outfit, and as Gauntlet's eyes narrowed, she pulled out a pair of mechanized goggles and a re-breather much like the kind Robin carried. Gifts from Marissa Mori.

"Got these!" Hyperthermia said, and began putting them on.

"Just our lu-" Gauntlet said, before Robin cut him off and hurled a Birdarang at Hyperthermia, trying to take advantage of her distracted state.

It worked, with the Birdarang slamming into the left side of Hyperthermia's head. The girl staggered back and fell to one knee, letting out a keening cry of intense pain.

"OWWWWWWWWWWWW! FUCK OWWWWWW!" Hyperthermia screamed, holding her head.

"…How did that not-" Gauntlet said.

"Armor." Scalpel said.

"WHAT? SHE'S WEARING WORKOUT CLOTHES!"

"Magic armor." Robin said, irritated with himself. He'd tried to get around the girl's hood, but the opening had been too small for him to throw with that degree of accuracy and said hood had blunted his strike.

"Oh sure! Magic armor! Why not? I bet she has a utility belt too, but she thought it made her hips look big so she left it home!" Gauntlet said, even as he slid yellow energy over his eyes. He knew what was coming.

"YOU FUCKING ASSHOLES THAT FUCKING HURT!" Hyperthermia screamed, and slammed out her hands. The trees in front of the girl literally EXPLODED, the girl's anger throwing off her control. Instead of vaporizing the trees, they were just blasted into a million flaming pieces of wood, Hyperthermia burning another path before her even as further trees caught flame. The male Titans had gotten the hell out of dodge, but with the rapidly spreading fire, dodge would quickly become the only place there was.

"Gauntlet, do something to distract her! Scalpel, get your warhammer back out!"

"I LOST IT UP THERE!" Scalpel cursed, pointing at where the three Titans had just come. Between that, the heat starting to really get to him, and the current situation, he was in a bad mood.

"THEN WE'LL IMPROVISE! MOVE! WE'RE NOT GOING TO LAST LONG IN HERE!" Robin yelled, before shoving his own re-breather in.

"Right, right…what shall I do? No, no, that wouldn't work, that requires jello…no, can't do that without a straight man…aha! Maybe…" Gauntlet said, and focused himself. With one careful leap, he landed down near Hyperthermia, wrapping the Gauntlet's shield energies around himself and tuning it so high that he couldn't even move. The Genocide member had, by now, finished putting on her goggles and rebreather, but it couldn't disguise the raw hate in her body language. Gauntlet responded by putting a big smile on his face (the nice thing about the Gauntlet power was that he was still clearly visible through it, despite the golden tint) and crossed his arms.

Hyperthermia blasted him. Gauntlet felt the sweat he'd just emitted boil away. He kept his stance and his expression.

"What are you so happy about?" Hyperthermia growled.

"I know something you don't know!"

"…what?" Hyperthermia said.

"I can't tell you."

"What?"

"It's a secret."

"WHAT?"

"So I can't tell you."

"Tell me!"

"No."

"TELL ME!"

"No."

"TELL ME OR I'LL ROAST YOUR ASS!"

"Then I can't tell you."

"…TELL ME!" Hyperthermia snarled, the ground beginning to burn away around her from her sheer heat.

"Fine, fine. I'll tell you." Gauntlet said. "This was all just a big distraction."

Hyperthermia stared.

The tree that landed on her was mostly vaporized by the heat, but enough impact was left from the toss to throw Hyperthermia onto her face. Scalpel landed by Gauntlet, seizing onto the cocooned Titan and leaping back off with him towards Robin before Hyperthermia could recover and turn her heat back on full bore.

"What are we doing?" Gauntlet said, before shoving in his own re-breather. The fiery trees were finally filling the forest with smoke.

"She's a visual person." Robin said, pulling out a disc and adjusting it. "So, we take it away."

Scalpel proceeded to slash repeatedly at the ground with his claws, throwing up a plume of dust from the dry, loose soil that the forest had ultimately died from. Dropping his customized explosive before Gauntlet shielded the three, Robin turned the plume into a massive cloud of dust and smoke.

"YOU CAN'T HIDE FROM ME!" Hyperthermia yelled, and fired blindly into the cloud. Gauntlet hadn't needed any instruction once he realized what Robin was doing; he immediately threw up an arched Gauntlet shield, protecting his teammates from the front and sides. The blast missed, but the heat of it would have still slammed into the Titans' side like a blow in and of itself. Robin, in the meantime, crouched a bit, making minute adjustments to his optical readings. He could see a lot better than Hyperthermia could, but that wasn't saying a whole lot in the end. Not with the shot he had to make.

"You want me to throw out a line, yank her hood off?" Gauntlet asked.

"Could let her pinpoint our position." Robin said, before a heat blast slammed directly into Gauntlet's shield, the temperature raking across the Titans' skin despite the protection.

"You sure she's smart enough to think of that?"

"She keeps surprising us. We can't _rely _on her being stupid…" Robin said, and then hurled his Birdarang. Gauntlet surprised himself by instantly making a hole in his shield for the weapon to go through, at the precise right location. He'd come a long way since he'd tried to make the Sonic Boom a three-man trick.

Despite that, the weapon missed, striking Hyperthermia in the shoulder and partially knocking her down. Getting up with a scream, the Genocide member stopped doing focused blasts and unleashed an outright wave of heat, Gauntlet extending the shield to completely cover them. The second Hyperthermia let off, Robin threw another Birdarang. This one took her in the chest, the weapon spinning off in a smoking mess as Hyperthermia flew backwards and landed on her back. Rolling to her side, spitting out the re-breather, and coughing while she held where she'd been struck briefly made Gauntlet feel sorry for her. She likely had no idea of the extent of things, of just who she'd signed her soul over to. Gauntlet had been there, once. There were a few dark alleys in Uberton he might have found his way to, had Pangloss not found him.

"She's not really cut out for war, is she?" Scalpel said, apparently sharing similar thoughts.

"Yeah…we can feel sorry for her after she's stopped trying to kill us." Gauntlet said. "Robin?"

"Got the range." Robin said. "And…"

The third Birdarang lashed through the air, but ultimately ended up missing Hyperthermia by less than an inch. Moving onto her knees, Hyperthermia shoved her re-breather back in and remained on her knees, her head down and her shoulder heaving.

"She's doing something." Scalpel said.

"Gauntlet, floor." Robin said. Gauntlet immediately covered the ground beneath the three Titans in case Hyperthermia tried another eruption trick. Such an attack would still send them flying, but that was better than being roasted. Hyperthermia remained where she was, head down.

"Is she crying?" Gauntlet said.

"No. Hyperventilating." Robin said. "A note, guys. Her heat shields lose efficiency when she's upset, vanish outright when she's distracted."

"Well then. Time's a wastin' when we could be. By that I mean beating her. Not being beaten. Sorry, my stock of witticisms is kind of low these days."

"Robin?" Scalpel said. The Titan leader held up a hand, flaming trees crashed down around the Titans and Hyperthermia, the Genocide member remaining in her position. Robin was debating whether he should throw a Birdarang directly at her head again and try and get her to reveal herself, or tell Gauntlet to go ahead with his 'pull off hood' suggestion, when it happened.

The wind picked up.

Picked up suddenly and violently, sweeping across them (or rather, Gauntlet's shield) with a howl. The Titans recoiled, even as the smoke and dust cloud was blown away, exposing them.

"WHAT THE FUCK!" Gauntlet yelled. "I'M BEGINNING TO THINK-!"

Robin whirled around, fleeing from the Genocide member, and Gauntlet immediately fell in beside him without questioning it, Scalpel doing likewise.

"-THAT SHE HAS LESS HEAT POWERS AND MORE 'WHATEVER THE HELL SHE LIKES' POWERS!"

"Hardly! She pulled all the heat out of a mass of air in this crater and dumped it all in an opposing mass! Maybe even slammed the superheated mass into the cooled one! Instant hot and cold front collision! You know what that means!" Robin yelled.

"Actually no I don't!"

"IT MEANS RUN FASTER!" Scalpel roared. Gauntlet took a moment to look over his shoulder, and saw exactly why Robin had begun his immediate sprint. It wasn't to escape Hyperthermia after she'd blown away their cover. When Gauntlet had dropped the shield to do that, Robin had confirmed that the wind was blowing in their faces. Which meant that the sudden, violent gale in the crater had turned the burning forest into an outright firestorm that was exploding towards them like a devouring giant.

"You know, is it me, or are metas becoming stronger?" Scalpel abruptly asked after his yell, in an odd bit of humor timing for the alien.

"Considering _we _can make observational quips while trying to outrun the fireball? Seems like." Gauntlet replied. Then the firestorm was on them, the blast wave consuming the last part of the forest's body before exploding up against the crater's edge, fire and debris belching up from the lowered lip on its opposite side.

Hyperthermia remained where she stood, surrounded by charred remains of trees and clouds of ash. The heat of the fire hadn't bothered her in the slightest, and her equipment kept her sighted and breathing.

"I may not be that smart, but the master is. And he taught me." Hyperthermia said. Heat exploded up around her, blowing off the ash that had settled on her white track suit. "Too bad you were too stupid to get out of his way."

* * *

Garfield Logan was a comedian by nature for a reason. Under the comedy lurked a thrice-forged soul, first by his unique metagene activation, then by the Doom Patrol, and finally by the Titans. Beast Boy had seen a lot of facets of hell, and come away with the knowledge that it didn't really change that much. Why not laugh? The supreme confidence of a clown.

Beast Boy's confidence, unfortunately, could not overcome certain facts on the battlefield. That being that his enemy could fire acid in large-scale attacks, and that striking him was little better than shooting a Xenomorph alien at close range.

"Ha! Come on, buddy! You talked so big, and now you're right back into de silent treatment! Doing so little with da gold, too!" Carcinogen said, firing blasts of acidic smoke at every bit of movement he could discern. Beast Boy scampered among the rocks as a ferret, keeping one step away from the attacks, but he knew full well that he'd run out of luck, or room, before long.

"Come on, little 'un. It won't hurt…much. I t'ink." Carcinogen said, peering around at the rocky landscape, parts of it being eaten away by toxic green chemicals. For a moment, the Genocide member wondered if Beast Boy had somehow snuck away over the nearby hill…

Beast Boy reared up and swatted Carcinogen from behind, his giant lion's paw nearly wrapping around his whole head. Beast Boy hadn't used claws, and he'd pulled his 'punch', hoping that caught unawares, the Jamaican's defensive measures wouldn't be activated, knowing if he was wrong…

He was. Carcinogen's head exploded with green gas, and Beast Boy reared and rolled back, turning back human and clutching his burning hand. He had no real idea if it was melting off or not, but damn if it didn't feel that way. Worse, Carcinogen only stumbled forward a few steps before turning around, chuckling.

"Not a' bad box, kid. It crosses, though." Carcinogen said. The changeling hadn't gotten a real good dose of his essence, not enough to mutilate, but it was more than enough to cause pain. "You a'-"

Beast Boy's body mass exploded, and suddenly the smaller man was looming over the Jamaican as a T-Rex.

"Big one!" Carcinogen said, and then Beast Boy brought a massive foot down on him.

The same green gas exploded from beneath Beast Boy's foot, and the dinosaur's howl echoed across the island. Turning back, Beast Boy staggered a few steps before collapsing, his foot joining his hand in feeling like it was in a nest of army ants. He'd felt that even through the thick scales and hide of the dinosaur form. How in the hell could he…

The gas cloud flowed back together, reforming into Carcinogen, seemingly unaffected by having multiple tons of dinosaur dropped on him. Then again, if Beast Boy had seen him shrug off direct Starbolt blasts, he might not have been so surprised.

"Dis just ain't your scene, Titan. You cannot touch me, but I…I sure makin' a mark on you." Carcinogen said, more toxic miasma floating up from his hands. "Wanna beg? Surely you bein' you, you done it before."

"At least I get what I beg for!" Beast Boy snapped back, before blinking. "Um, wait…"

Carcinogen threw back his head and roared laughter. The bullet slammed into his shoulder a moment later, toxic gas erupting from the wound. Carcinogen whirled around, and the second bullet impacted him square in the forehead, more gas exploding from his head as he stumbled backwards. The wounds closed in a moment, the bullets having passed through, but that fact didn't register on Carcinogen, whose body immediately exploded into a nearly black-green cloud of swirling mist. A few more bullets struck, and melted within, the cloud reforming into a hand that sent a counter-attack against his ambusher.

Morgue's body exploded into its own mass of bats, swiftly abandoning the perch she had used to get a vantage point and fire on Beast Boy's attacker. Despite their rapid scattering, a few were still caught in the poison cloud, the acidic blast reducing them to nearly nothing. Sophie reformed behind a rock, breathing heavily, feeling patches of her skin burn beneath her uniform. Too damn close.

"YA FUCKIN' SHIT!" Carcinogen snarled when he reformed. Turning back around to face Beast Boy, the Jamaican discovered he was gone. Grinding his teeth, Carcinogen aimed behind himself, gas erupting at high pressure from his hand and expanding the cloud there to form a taller barrier. No more sneak attacks.

"COM' BACK OUT, ANIMAL! WE HAVE PLENTY TO SETTLE!" Carcinogen said. Nearby, Beast Boy slithered away beneath some rocks as a snake, wracking his brain for a plan.

As if in sync, Morgue's attempt to return to her perch was cut off by more Flutter-Byes and Boojums, weapons blazing. The rotund girl proved surprisingly fast in her retreat, fleeing over the rocky island, bullets and sonic blasts tearing up the ground behind her. The attack was cut off by the abrupt introduction of a Marchare. Fortunately for Sophie, said introduction was white Shimmer lines smashing it into one of the Flutter-Byes. Savior got one of the Boojums as well before he whirled around to dodge a Haber-Dasher stabbing him in the back. Arching down and spinning onto his hands, using the Shimmer for added balance, Savior lashed out a foot and hammered the Haber-Dasher into the nearest rock. Whirling back onto his feet, Savior grabbed up another chunk of rock and rammed it into the Haber-Dasher as hard as he could, before cart-wheeling away from the blasts of more Marchares.

"Why haven't you gotten the hint yet?" Savior said, coming to a stop, Shimmer strands flowing out from his hand and interlacing amongst themselves, manifesting his S4 blade. The second the Marchares turned to fire at him, Savior leapt backwards, semi-somersaulting, twin Shimmer lines planting themselves in the ground. The shots fired at the Titan went wild as the Shimmer lines hurled Savior forward abruptly, turning his retreat into a charge.

The nearest Marchare was slashed across the torso, tiny tendrils spiraling off the blade upon impact and invading the gash in the robot's armor. The Shimmer crushed and broke everything he could in the second it had, before Noel hit the ground, sprang up, and brought the S4 down on the second Marchare's head, following it with the same tendril invasion.

"PIECE! OF! JUNK!" Savior said, cutting down two more Marchares and swinging at a third, the last one being the only one who could dodge. Savior settled for throwing Shimmer lines out of his other hand and tearing the Marchare's weapon free before knocking it away. Whirling around as two Haber-Dashers dropped down behind Savior, the Titan immediately leapt to the attack, S4 and bladed staffs clashing. The swordfight lasted several seconds before Shimmer lines tore up from the ground behind the two and impaled into them before they could react, pushing them into Savior's thrusting hands, a fury of further energy lines erupting through the wire robots and tearing them apart from within.

This time, Savior spied something in one of the robot's heads. Pulling the long, thin device free with his talent, lights on it flashing, the Titan quickly deduced it was a camera.

"HEY! HEY YOU!" Savior yelled into it. "I KNOW YOU'RE THERE! I know you don't have an unlimited amount of robots! When you run out, my friends and I are going to find you. And then we're going to stick you in a pit so deep you'll forget the sun ever exist-!"

The Marchare slammed into Savior even as the buzz saw that had extended out of its arm lashed out and tore into the Shimmer the Titan was using to hold the camera. Pain slammed into Savior's body, starting from the back of his head and slicing down his spine to detonate in his ankles. The resulting impact on the ground nearly knocked him unconscious.

Staying conscious wasn't much better, as the Marchare immediately tried to stick the buzz saw through Savior's face. Lacking his talent, Savior grabbed its arm with his hands, micro servers whining as the robot pushed back.

"Clever…girl…" Savior hissed. He could vaguely sense other robots arriving. What a grand time, all around.

Morgue wasn't much better off, pinned down by the last, largest cluster of flying Wonderland-types Marissa Mori could throw together. For a moment, the former mortician wondered where the _Dyson's Fear _had gotten off to, and then concluded that it probably wouldn't have helped her much anyway: it was for singular targets, preferably large, not swarms of flying ones. At least she had a good position…

Until she heard a familiar bumping cadence. Swallowing a muffled curse, Morgue ran and threw herself forward as the last two Tweedle bombs that remained leapt upward and hammered into Sophie's rock protrusion, blowing it to bits. The swarm buzzed around the dust and smoke, trying to find their target.

Morgue came out shooting, a gun in each hand. If she got taken out by a bunch of storybook robots, she'd never hear the end of it in superhero heaven.

"Come out, come out, whe'ver you are." Carcinogen taunted, safe behind his poison shield and barely aware of all the noise beyond it. He blasted another rock, thinking maybe Beast Boy was hiding behind that one. He wasn't.

He was still good at it though, especially when Carcinogen turned a bit to the left and found him standing there. The dull red on his hand clashed with the green of his skin, but the changeling kept his stance firm despite his injuries. Carcinogen raised a hand to blast him, and then, after a moment, lowered it.

"Why ya actin' like you cris now, mon?" Carcinogen said. Despite his cocky tone, he had noted that his enemy's hand and foot seemed to better than they should have been. Never mind that the Titan could still see clearly, even after taking a face-full of Carcinogen's essence. Beast Boy seemed to ponder the question…and then pointed at the Jamaican. More specifically, pointed behind him. Carcinogen's eyes widened.

"OH NO YA DON'!" Carcinogen said, whirling around, transforming into his protective gas state in mid-motion. He couldn't talk in said form, but he could still see. What he saw was…

Nothing.

Beast Boy jumped up, and his form erupted outward again, this time as a giant mythical roc bird. His massive wings swept the air, sending intense wind blasting across the island and into Carcinogen's gaseous form. The effort seemed to pull the cloud apart, stalling in its attempts to reform, the poison barrier behind it being equally scattered. Beast Boy cawed, a high-pitched roar that would have hurt anyone nearby's ears, and beat his wings as hard as he could. Once, twice…

Too much. The green bird shrank back down to Beast Boy's normal form, the Titan breathing heavily. He'd been hurt too much and hadn't been able to hold the state. Damn it all.

Freed from the grip of the beating wings, Carcinogen surged back and manifested once more. He looked deeply aggrieved, but also thoughtful, in a dark way.

"Just won' give up willya. Refuse at go down." Carcinogen said.

"It's in the contract." Beast Boy said.

"Feh. You outta tricks, boy. Last one was neat, but you boring." Carcinogen said. "Fine by me. I can make me own fun."

The faint traces of gas sucked into Carcinogen's body, and the villain seemed to settle more firmly onto the ground. Beast Boy cocked his head.

"You wanna act like a man? You no man, and I don't mean dah animal shit." Carcinogen said, interlacing his fingers and cracking them. "Come on den. See how well you play at a man's game. Old school, back before you and I set on da path o' power."

Beast Boy stared, before turning into a bloodhound and sniffing the air. The burning, sour reek that had composed the Jamaican's body was gone, replaced by normal, human scents. As far as Beast Boy could tell, he'd turned his powers off.

"…how can I trust you?" Beast Boy said.

"You can't, Titan. You don't have much choice. Or hope, in either way." Carcinogen said, gesturing with a finger. "Com'on, I'll give ya a free shot."

Beast Boy pondered for a moment, and then turned into a ferret again, dashing most of the distance over to Carcinogen before he returned to human form and swung out a fist.

Carcinogen caught it.

"I lied." Carcinogen said, and slammed his head into Beast Boy's face.

* * *

The odd thing, to Terra, was that the fight she was currently in was going to ruin hot tubs for her for the rest of her life.

The rest of it, the danger, the power of her enemy, the fact that he'd nearly boiled her face off less than half a minute ago, really didn't register. The task before her was simple. There was an enemy. He resisted getting smashed. Ergo, she had to work with her teammates to find a way to smash it that it couldn't shrug off. Considering she was throwing down with the two most powerful members of her team, Terra had little fear.

_Terra, don't get cocky._

The faint whisper echoed in the back of Terra's mind. Raven. She always was observant. Also nosy, but Terra kept that part to herself. After all this was over, she wouldn't have to deal with the sorceress any more. Some things, it seemed, just could not be forgiven.

"Don't worry about me, Raven. Let's KICK ASS." Terra said, dashing forward, calling on the rocks she'd pulled from the sea bed, huge masses of wet stone that thankfully didn't get corrupted by the same dark taint of the island upon touching them. The water dragon head loomed before her, but Terra smashed a rock down its 'throat' without a second thought.

"Are you still trying that?" Aguardiente said, though Terra couldn't actually hear him. He spoke with action instead, more dragon heads surging up and breathing flesh-destroying clouds of steam. Terra flew away from them as Starfire charged in, explosive bolts of emerald energy blowing apart more of the constructs. The shattered dragons just reformed into new one, blasts of boiling water and steam erupting from their mouths, the alien dodging like a madwoman, even when Terra returned and hurled more rocks into the fray. Aguardiente looked down on all of it impassively, before he whirled around and fired several water orbs at an attacking Raven. They exploded against her shield, and she countered with her own blasts of force, which just pierced through Aguardiente's liquid form with no effect.

"I warned you you weren't enough." Aguardiente said, blades of water tearing from his body and flying towards Raven, who shot them out of the sky. "I command the skin of the world, the building blocks of life. Your little displays do little to stop the tide…"

"Ah, there's that prison life showing itself. Let your own personality subsume beneath the will of the biggest, meanest bastard there is. Because I know that tone and structure, Whelan, and it's entirely that of the creature you have chosen to play lapdog to." Raven said. She had tried to be decent beforehand, but her enemy had made it clear he regarded it as a weakness, something to scorn. Raven, he would find, could be just as cruel as she could kind. Evidentially, he didn't much like that fact, as he countered her words with a blast of water from his hands so intense it could have drilled through rock. Raven met it with her own power, the two warring for supremacy.

"Trying to…distract me with anger? It WON'T WORK." Aguardiente said, water erupting from his back to defend against any sneak attack. Down beneath her, Raven felt, rather than saw, the heads of the hydra construct rising up to tear her down.

"So you say." Raven said, and redoubled her efforts against her enemy's attack.

An efforts she turned off like a switch, or rather, turned away, Raven slicing to the side, her dark power withdrawing to her. Starfire flew down from the sky above, but not to attack Aguardiente. Instead, she flew past Raven, the sorceress transferring the dark energies to her, covering her form in armor. Starfire plunged into the heart of Aguardiente's water beast, and then in a blinding blaze of green power, detonated a gigantic Starbolt sphere within it. The explosion tore the water creature apart, shattering Aguardiente's pillar in the process. The Genocide member recoiled, trying to adjust himself.

Terra swung in, ramming the rock platform down on Aguardiente's head. The attack should have smashed the blue-cloaked man flat, but instead, inexplicably, he ended up impaled through the level piece of rock. The Wile. E type position was swiftly revealed to be intentional, as Terra yanked up her arm and sent Aguardiente, caught off guard and briefly trapped, spinning backwards through the air. Starfire shot up from his collapsing water creature, a final spray of Starbolts striking the rock and consuming it in explosions. Raven thrust out her own hand, and ebony power surged into existence around the blasts. Clenching her fist, the dark energies contracted around it, crushing the rock, fire, and water within to a hideously small space before they broke. Smoking, Aguardiente tumbled down and hit the ground, water splashing from his form as he repeatedly hit the rocks.

"Wow. You really don't like him, do you Raven?" Terra said. She managed to keep the dark sarcasm out of her voice, but Raven felt it anyway.

"She held back." Starfire said, rejoining the three. Raven did not get a chance to reply, her eyes locked on Aguardiente's form. He was getting up.

"Too much." Raven said, and took off towards her enemy, Starfire mirroring her action. Terra rolled her eyes and joined them, calling rocks to her aid.

"That…also…_hurt…_" Aguardiente said, before the ground cracked and water flowed up into him from beneath. Terra cursed inwardly; if the island was so riddled with tunnels that Aguardiente could just keep drawing water through it and into him, she would have been able to snap the isle like a twig had the Lord's curse not cut her off.. _Should we try tossing him into the clouds?_

_No, he__'__ll probably make it rain blades. _Raven thought back.

_There may be-_

Aguardiente cut off Starfire's thought, lashing his arm out and throwing globs of water nearly at the speed of sound. The projectiles impacted against Raven's shield, and the three girls split up to provide a harder target profile. Aguardiente lashed out with his other hand, a spray of water blades flying towards the girls that they dodged around. Terra tried a trick of her own, shattering one of her rocks and sending it whirling towards Aguardiente in a tornado. All this did was cause a hundred small rocks to fly through him instead of one large rock, and the Genocide member turned his hooded face towards her.

"You don't get it." Aguardiente said, and lanced out his hand, water exploding from the ground and firing at Terra in a car-sized stream-blast. Terra slammed her rocks together in front of her, interlocking them together as the boiling ray smashed into them. Terra's eyes shone bright as she fought the pressure, moving onward and down. _"You really don't."_

Aguardiente's clawed fingers snapped out into an arrow shape, and within his water torrent a tiny stream abruptly became ten times fiercer. Terra never saw the attack coming, the burning stream ripping through her rock shield and ramming directly into her clavicle and throat. Even with her protection, Terra felt her windpipe nearly cave in, the bone beneath the strike cracking like fine china. The impact knocked her off her rock, sending her tumbling to the ground as she gasped for air.

"TERRA!" Raven said, dropping her main guard and diving for her teammate. Aguardiente immediately turned his stream on the sorceress, but the girl barely seemed to notice, a mediocre one-handed shield not saving the woman from being scorched by boiling water. Grabbing onto Terra, Raven did her best to reinforce her shield, even as Terra gasped in agony, blood bubbling from her mouth.

"Drowning comes in so many ways, doesn't it?" Aguardiente said.

Starfire hit the Genocide member so hard that her punch echoed across the battlefield, Aguardiente's head flying off like a champagne cork. Before he could reform, Starfire flew back and cut loose with a combined eye and hand blast, the water manipulator vanishing in an explosion of dust and smoke. Starfire flew up instinctively, dodging to the side before the water erupted from beneath her, firing blast after blast at Aguardiente's last position in an attempt to stave off effective counter-attacks.

"Tara, hold on…I have this…" Raven said, placing a hand on the Titan's shoulder. Pain shot through Raven's upper body, but she endured it, as she always did. Terra's breathing slowed down some, her clavicle knitting back together…

Starfire's assault did not prevent Aguardiente from reforming, but he did not seem to be able to muster much of an offense. Taking heart, Starfire pressed her attack, unleashing her eye beams and attempting, once again, to boil away enough of Aguardiente's form to force him out of it…

"Need…a moment." Terra said, calling her fallen rock to her. Raven nodded, setting Terra down on the perch. Terra stared at the woman, the genuine concern in her eyes. Pain. It could do a lot for viewpoints. Terra's had, for the most part, been focused on the pain Raven had caused her. Her secret, her lover's crime…

Yet this was the same Raven who tried so hard to fight against her supposed destiny. The empath, the healer, the one who have saved the Titans from death so many times. So unwilling to let her teammates suffer pain that she would take it into herself.

Could it really be said that she hadn't tried her hardest to make the best choice?

"Accursed…bitch…" Aguardiente said, firing weak water blasts.

"I have been called worse." Starfire replied.

"Really." Aguardiente said.

There was no indication for Starfire for what occurred. The mass of water that hammered down on her cast no shadow and made no sound. To her credit, Starfire sensed something was wrong two seconds before the sphere of liquid slammed down on her, but all that allowed her to do was look up and then throw up her arms. The tons of water smashed the alien into the ground like an insect, water spray soaking the air for miles.

"Kory." Raven said, turning around and flying off, leaving her shield of black energy behind. Terra watched her go. She still needed a few seconds…

_To do what? Everything we do, he just shrugs off. We can't make this a war of attrition, it won't work. But Raven can't think of anything, hell, Star's the warrior queen and none of her tactics have worked either. What can we do? He just keeps getting up and getting up…_

Starfire wasn't having as easy a time getting up, her body soaked to the skin, ugly bruises rising on where the orange flesh was exposed. The water rose up around her first, a dozen shifting blades, but a black claw scattered them before they could do more. Having fully reformed, Aguardiente walked towards the pair, water flowing into his body from the ground with every step, as Raven dropped down by Starfire and tried to help her up.

"Your companions are idiots. Fire and rock. Water snuffs fire and grinds rock down to nothing." Aguardiente said. "You've lost. Just like the pawn you're still stupid enough to call teammate."

Raven felt her heart sink. The feeling was brief, replaced by the sensation of Starfire digging her fingers into Raven's shoulder.

"You…KNOW…**NOTHING!**" Starfire thundered, her other hand firing off another Starbolt. It splashed right through Aguardiente's chest, exploding behind him.

"You'd be surprised." Aguardiente said, and lashed his hand out.

_Nothing works, he ignores it. Nothing WORKS, he just ignores…ignores?_

Raven stopped the water blade cold and returned fire with her own blades.

"_YOU'VE _lost. You chose _willingly _to side with that monster! He had to tear out most of _MY _teammate's brain! WHAT'S YOUR EXCUSE?" Raven snarled, lashing a giant black claw through Aguardiente.

"I know who I am when the day is over. Who are you?" Aguardiente said, and raised his hands. The two girls flew apart as the water pillars tore through the ground beneath them.

"Warriors! Champions! And so much more than a monster's lack-wit!" Starfire said, and lashed her eye beams across the ground, blowing up Aguardiente and spraying his form with dust.

"Brave talk, but all that matters is what goes down in the books." Aguardiente said, and snapped both arms out. Streams of rapidly snaking, jerking water shot from his arms, trying to carve into the two women.

"And there's your taskmaster speaking again, lickspittle." Raven said, slashing out with a black wing, shattering Aguardiente's attack.

"What does it matter who says it? All that matters is WHO'S RIGHT!" Aguardiente said, slamming his hands together. Water erupted from the ground behind him, forming a web-like pattern before dozens of spheres on the 'web' opened fire, hurling blades, spears, and crushing balls of boiling liquid.

"Your master twists, breaks, and violates every fact and viewpoint he can get his claws into until they're suitable to justify his acts." Raven said, forming another shield to stave off the assault.

"He can create nothing, guide nothing, and help NOTHING! You're just a tool for him to use and discard at his leisure!" Starfire said, dodging rapidly around the projectiles. She did not return fire, though her eyes blazed with green.

"People like him don't write the books that endure. Nor do they define the facts. The only right they have, they make, is the right they take off the cliff into the abyss." Raven said. Black claws tore from the ground and seized onto Aguardiente's water-web, tearing it down in a boiling spray that parted before Raven's shield. A moment later, she dropped it.

"And who are YOU?" Aguardiente said, and fired a blast of water from his hand. Raven jerked her head to the side, dodging it.

"I'm a Titan." Raven replied. A brief blast of Starfire's eye lasers distracted Aguardiente, and he recovered to watch Starfire drop down next to Raven

"I AM KORI'ANDER OF TAMARAN." Starfire said, and as one, the two women thrust up their hands. "And your accusations DON'T HOLD WATER!"

The emerald and midnight energies exploded from the pair's hands, blazing out and intertwining into a singular blast, the hybrid assault spiraling and slamming into Aguardiente like a runaway train. The drill did more then tear through the Genocide member's watery form: it carried it backwards, drawing it in and seemingly consuming it. However, by the nature of the merged attack, it did not end with a bang but rather a whimper, the two energies cancelling each other out and unceremoniously dropping a ragged, blue-clad form in the sand.

Raven recoiled slightly, her body flushing like she had a fever. Starfire was reacting in a similar way. They had gone a little too deep into that joint attack, and both were feeling the backlash. They'd need a brief moment to recover.

Except Aguardiente was getting up.

"_Sor'ke."_ Starfire murmured. Raven was in agreement, but gestured that they should move forward. Resuming an attack was, for the moment, out, but just hanging back where they were would denote weakness, something Raven did not want happening.

Aguardiente glared at the two women. His robe had reformed in tatters, and, as the water attempted to fully reform around his head, it failed, leaving his face exposed. His graying hair was plastered to his head, and water further ran along his age-worn features and the ugly burn that covered a fair part of Aguardiente's face and neck.

"I know what you are. You're _heroes._" Aguardiente said in a harsh whisper. "My parents thought they were heroes. Then they died. Then the others they were with claimed THEY were heroes…then another 'hero' came along and told them the truth, and they left me behind to rot. So did this 'hero'. Heroism took away everything I ever had. You know what you really are? You're worthless. Absolutely worthless. And I'm going to SHOW YOU THAT."

A deep rumbling sounded across the island, and Raven's tunnel vision abruptly broke. She had been so focused on Aguardiente shrugging off her and Starfire's attack that she hadn't paid attention to where they were. A beach, covered with dull, grayish sand. Their battle had taken them to the edge of the island.

_Of course you're near the water. Where do you think he got all those tons he dropped on Starfire, without her seeing it?_

The water abruptly receded away from the beach, even as the whole horizon was suddenly blocked out by a city-spanning mass of water rose up. Aguardiente stood to his full height, his ragged cloaks flapping around him, his arms out. Starfire and Raven hurled blasts at him, but they passed through or exploded on his form without a second thought.

"I will destroy you. Grind you and your fellow Titans into the rock and wash the remains out to sea. I will do what the Lord is too damn obsessed to do. I will kill you all." Aguardiente said, the tidal wave spanning all the higher beyond him.

"_X'Hal."_ Starfire said. Raven had nothing to say in return. Even at full strength, she would have been hard-pressed to stop a wave of this size, and all the other things she could do, she had tried (hadn't she?). What could she do? Retreat, grab her teammates, and get out of the wave's way? Would the Lord let one of his minions hit the island with a tidal wave? Would he…

The spray of sand just caught Raven's attention, the action happening in the corner of her eye…

Before Aguardiente thrust his hands fully upward, and the wave began roaring towards them.

"Raven?" Starfire said.

"We can…I…" Raven said. She had two ideas…

"You can die. Drown, burn, be dashed to pieces. I don't really care. Just get your fucking goddamn hero faces out of my-"

The rock rose up beneath Aguardiente, the sand shifting out from beneath him. It did not strike him, or toss him into the ground. Instead it rose him two feet up and away from the sand. The Genocide member, fully in the grip of concentration, could only look down.

"What is THIS?"

"A bowl." Terra said, dropping down between Raven and Starfire. The rock had indeed been carved in that shape. Aguardiente looked up, eyes burning with wrath.

"DO YOU THINK-!"

"Yes." Terra said, and the rocks dropped down on either side of Aguardiente, car-sized extensions of the geokinetic will. Aguardiente had time to scream, a scream of pure hateful rage.

The rocks smashed together, hammering the villain flat. Raven and Starfire stared. This had been done repeatedly, what could…

Terra answered their question when the rocks separated and, with Aguardiente trying to reform himself, immediately crashed back together. Again, and again, the rocks zoomed out and slammed Aguardiente between them, a pair of giant clapping hands, squashing the villain before he could reform himself.

And Raven understood. She reached out a hand, even as Terra continued hammering her rocks on the Genocide member, the tidal wave loomed, and Aguardiente screamed to the heavens as he tried to escape.

The rocks surged back out and back together, and then back…

"TERRA STOP!"

Terra stopped on a dime, even as Aguardiente's form solidified and then collapsed onto Terra's rock. With a quick pass of her own power, Raven removed every trace of moisture from the stone, leaving Aguardiente's limp, unconscious form there alone.

Terra glared out into the sea, and her eyes grew bright with gold light. With its master and wielder out of the fight, the unnatural tidal wave had lost most of its force, but it was still going through sheer inertia.

The seabed erupted, mountains rising up from it, the rocks slamming into the wave and killing the rest of its momentum. The water flattened out and flowed back onto the beach, flowing around and into the new rocks and chasms Terra had cut in her defense.

"Yeah. We're heroes. You hate us." Terra said, looking at Aguardiente's unconscious form. "Cry me a river."

"…he could not maintain himself under constant disruption." Starfire said, puzzling it out.

"All our attacks just briefly altered his form. He needed something of a longer bent. Our drill almost did it by accident, but Terra figured it out and did it properly." Raven said, looking at the geokinetic. "That was excellent work, Tara. You saved us all."

Terra wanted to primp, to brag that she'd puzzled out something neither her sorceress or warrior queen teammate had. A small, dark part of her wanted to rub it in Raven's face, for her crime.

_Except that's all what water-man knew, wasn't it? Maybe Noel can still go hang, but that doesn't change the rest of them._

"…I learned from the best." Terra said. "Come on. If we go beat up one of the other members of the Lord's fan club, we'll forever have one over all the other boys."

"And Sophie." Starfire said.

"ESPECIALLY Sophie." Terra said, rubbing her hands in exaggerated malicious glee.

* * *

The Tower kitchen was silent, save for the quiet tick of a clock on the wall. The nigh-musical ding of an oven timer briefly broke into the rhythmic ticking.

Silkie wriggled his way along the countertop, enjoying the odd stillness and peace his home so rarely saw. In the rudimentary manner in which pets think, he wondered where his loving orange mistress had gone, and what was she doing that she would leave him wit-

"**YES!" **Ryce screamed, rocketing to her feet from her meditating pose on the floor.

The aptly-named mutant silkworm let out a strangled sound and in its fear toppled from the counter. Meanwhile, the source of the frightening roar of triumph had taken to jumping up and down in a bizarre sort of victory dance.

"Hells to the yes! WINNIN'!" she cheered her left eye glowing with faint light. The wide grin tried not to falter at the fact that every step her family took and every victory they eked out made the visions in her left eye all the clearer. How closer were they to their very possible deaths now? When she could almost smell the salt water that miles away crashed into the rocks around her friends…

Silkie joined in with her joy, rubbing up against her shin despite having her guilt in making him fall. Ryce promptly bolted up onto the table in revulsion and fear to resume her watching with a mental reminder to burn her leg later.

* * *

Marissa Mori was not having as a fun time as Ryce. Firstly, her robots were getting stomped on. Secondly, that Savior had yelled at her through a camera. And now, one of the Lord's Genocide members (in more than a few ways, his STRONGEST member) had been defeated. The young woman, couldn't say for certain, but she thought she heard an annoyed sigh at the shattered, unconscious form of Brody Whalen that now displayed on her computers' screens, Raven having sealed him under a virtually airtight dome before the three had left him on a patch of dry rock.

"_**Age and wisdom yet again give way to youth and defiance."**_ The Lord said. So she _had _heard something.

"Shall I fire another shot at them sir?" Marissa said. She did not bring up that, at the end, Aguardiente had been so mad he'd nearly swamped the whole island. Then again, she suspected the Lord wouldn't have just stood around and let that happen.

"_**No. They're too scattered and likely won't fall for it twice."**_ The Lord said, his dark shade shifting around Marissa's back to the other shoulder. _**"I suspect I know how this is going to end."**_

"Sir?"

"_**They're untested. Things ending well for them were long odds at best. They've played their role, and it will be considered a success once all is said and done." **_The Lord said. _**"I can no longer divert my attention here, Miss Mori. When the situation is resolved, activate the fourth immediately and send him out."**_

"Yes sir." Marissa said, sliding open a secondary keypad and typing at it. Behind her, the shadowy tube began to arc with further black energies, the power flashing both in and out of the capsule.

"_**Miss Mori, in the event of a breach…you are prepared to defend yourself, aren't you?"**_

"…yes sir."

"_**Hopefully it will not come to that. If it does…I'll do that I can. Hold the line, Miss Mori. Our destiny exercises its influence over us even when, as yet, we have not yet learned its nature: it is our future that lays down the law of our today."**_

"It will be done, sir." Marissa said.

Within the tube, a pair of brilliant white eyes opened.

* * *

Gauntlet liked beaches. He did not like sand in his mouth. He especially disliked sand in his mouth after he and his teammates, literally one step away from getting incinerated, had been blown out of a crater only to land in a violent tumble on the beach on the edge of the island they'd arrived at. The sand in Gauntlet's mouth had been partially due to him grabbing Robin as they landed, lest the fully human young man end up a broken sack of mess from his tumbling impact against the beach. Scalpel had been on his own in that regard, but Gauntlet figured the alien could handle it. He was tough. He may have been weakened by the heat…but he was tough. That was more important, right?

"Ugghhhhh…you remember when villains just robbed banks? I remember! Maybe we should start a petition. Villains, rob some banks! They're insured! It's such a better use of your time than genocide!"

"Don't say that. You might get her attention." Scalpel said. "Robin?"

"I'm okay." Robin said, standing up, the other two Titans doing likewise. "Scalpel?"

"Could be worse…could be a lot better." Scalpel said, dusting his hat off. How he kept that thing on in such chaos, Gauntlet had no idea.

"So. Do you think she'll assume she killed us and go back to her crazy bastard leader for praise?" Gauntlet asked.

"…probably a coin flip." Robin said. Then his eyes tracked upwards. Hyperthermia had emerged, and was flying directly at him. "Apparently, Dent's coin."

"What's the plan?" Gauntlet said. Robin didn't answer. Gauntlet took this as a good sign. If Timothy Drake had nothing, he tended to be swift and up-front in that regard in situations like this. The fact that he said nothing meant he was thinking. Any villain worth his salt got worried at the concept of a Bat-scion thinking.

Hyperthermia landed, and Scalpel charged at her immediately. Sand turned to glass beneath the girl's feet, and the alien veered off, repelled by the insane heat she had called. Gauntlet winced inwardly. He didn't know how much more the alien could endure.

"Why don't you give up?" Hyperthermia said. The girl had removed her goggles and re-breather, though she'd put her hood back up afterwards, much to the Titan's annoyance.

"I could ask you the same thing!" Gauntlet said.

"I'm winning! WINNING!" Hyperthermia said, grinning and flashing a peace sign.

"Wow, if this had come out when it was supposed to, the overlord would have been out a reference. Hooray?" Gauntlet said. He did not start when Robin literally appeared over his shoulder. He was used to it.

"Gauntlet, I need another distraction." Robin said in an expert whisper, Hyperthermia having turned to blast at Scalpel, trying to take advantage of the alien's slowing tread. "Whatever you do, keep her on THIS BEACH."

"Gotcha." Gauntlet said, and then covered Robin's movement by spawning a Gauntlet flail and leaping towards Hyperthermia with it. Hyperthermia easily dodged, though Gauntlet meant for that to happen, and he promptly switched back to a shield as she directed a heat blast toward him, Gauntlet feeling more clumps of sand fuse around his feet and ankles.

"So! Did the Lord tell you that this is the last bright spot every villain gets before her face gets pushed in?" Gauntlet said.

"The master would prefer you alive!" Hyperthermia said, indicating she hadn't been trying as hard as she could have.

"WHAT? YOU TRIED TO KILL US A DOZEN TIMES IN THE LAST TEN MINUTES!"

"The master said you could handle it!"

"He also tends to treat his minions a bit like used toilet paper, sooooo if you want to trust what he has to say, I respectfully find your lifestyle choices stupid!"

"The master said you would say that, too!"

"Well, I doubt the Lord mentioned this, but that outfit makes your thighs look HUGE."

"WHAT?" Hyperthermia said, and reared back her arms to redouble her attack. Gauntlet dove to the side, running for the water, the female Genocide member burning a black crater where Gauntlet had stood before running off after him. Slapping his namesake, Gauntlet fired off a tiny energy string that bloomed into a platform, an unseen leg beneath it planting it into the ground. Gauntlet took a running jump onto it, even as another string made another one. Bouncing off the first one, Gauntlet created a third one even as he headed for the second.

"COME BACK HERE!" Hyperthermia yelled, leaping onto the first platform. "I was never any good at Ma-!"

Gauntlet dispelled the platforms, and Hyperthermia promptly fell into the rushing surf. The steam that immediately erupted over him and most of the beach was far from pleasant, but it was better then Hyperthermia's own power.

"AH MOTHERFUCKING FUCKING BASTARDS! FUCKERS! FUCKING CHEATERS! ASSHOLE FUCKS!" Hyperthermia raged, even as the steam cloud grew larger and larger. Gauntlet quickly leapt back to the beach. He wasn't much surprised when Robin joined him.

"Gauntlet, listen." Robin said, and whispered a ten second plan into his ear.

"Robin, where am I going to find a luchador's mask and a dozen eggs at this hour?" Gauntlet said, before slapping Robin on the shoulder to indicate that he understood the actual plan.

"We'll probably need a little more distraction."

"I CAN HEAR YOU!" Hyperthermia yelled, flying out of the steam towards the pair.

Gauntlet promptly energy-punched her back into the surf, the girl screaming as more steam obscured her.

"Or maybe I can just do that?" Gauntlet said.

"OWWWWWWWWWWW!"

"Nope." Robin said.

"You're right, though. Her general heat output is dropping." Gauntlet whispered.

"We just need to make sure SHE doesn't realize that."

"Why are you so MEAN?" Hyperthermia said, stumbling out of the steam again, holding the side of her face.

"MEAN? YOU'RE TRYING TO KILL US! This outrage is deja vu!" Gauntlet yelled.

"I'm only trying to hurt you because I was ordered to. Who told you to hurt ME?" Hyperthermia said.

"I…you've reached a singularity of stupid. I'm having a hard time believing you're real." Gauntlet said.

"It's like philosophy." Robin said.

"I will ROAST you." Hyperthermia said, and took off into the air, straight up.

"Oh yes, Robert. I've come to the conclusion she doesn't fly via some sort of hot air manipulation. She actually has a flight power. She just _thinks _its hot air manipulation." Robin said, noting how fast the Genocide member had risen.

"Well, why SHOULD her powers make sense? Maybe solipsism is true and her stupidity is powering reality!"

"Well, no, it's based on-run." Robin said, and took off down the beach with Gauntlet before Hyperthermia turned the fifty-square feet they had been standing on into a black glass crater.

"That's right, RUN!" Hyperthermia said, and threw her hands behind her, blasting heat to send her ripping down from the sky like a bomb. In a startling bit of bad luck, Robin did not manage to sense her coming in time, Hyperthermia actually managing to hit what she aimed for as she rammed a foot into Robin's back, sending him tumbling down the beach. Gauntlet turned and then threw himself backwards, Hyperthermia lashing out with her hands and cutting a black swath across the sand.

"Don't you know it's not nice to hit a lady?" Hyperthermia said.

"Look lady, I'm going to be frank with you. You're no lady." Gauntlet said.

"No. I am woman. Hear me ROAR!" Hyperthermia yelled, and fired a ball-like pulse of heat that scorched Gauntlet's side as he dodged, the blast hitting the ground and burning through it, leaving a tunnel that went on for who knows how far. "IN A VOICE THAT'S TOO BIG TO IGNORE!"

"How bout a lip too big to ignore?" Gauntlet said, firing off a Gauntlet punch. Hyperthermia did her own acrobatics to dodge, her flying ability making it simple for her to be light on her feet.

"Hah, I knew it! You're a missee…misssar…misseekgee…mistaken…you're a woman hater!"

"And you're white trash, so we're about even."

"Bastard!"

"Klorbag."

"Fucker!"

"Your mother dresses you funny!"

"ASSHOLE!"

"XANTHIPPE!"

"…that's not EVEN A WORD!" Hyperthermia said, and fired twin blasts at Gauntlet. He dodged them, but took another tumble in the sand, the abrasive ground scraping against his exposed burns and reminding him that this was a lot more serious than an insult fight. Where was Robin, or Scalpel? Were they putting the plan in motion…?

"You know, I'll be happy when your hole stops making noise." Gauntlet said, getting up.

"The master will be happy when I deliver you to him. He really doesn't like you." Hyperthermia said.

"You DO know that my dad's a secret agent and my mom's a ninja, right? You kill me and you'll never see the shuriken. Or bullet. They'll probably make it a race. And let's not forget there's still Starfire and Morgue to avenge my friends."

The female Genocide member raised her hands…and then paused. Her expression, after a moment, shifted to thoughtful sadness.

"…You really think that'll happen, don't you?" Hyperthermia said. "Don't you know you're alone in the end?"

"I see three of us and one of you. So I wouldn't do talking about being alone." Gauntlet said, and tried to slap Hyperthermia back into the water. The girl's feet left the air, Hyperthermia flying to the side and then charging at Gauntlet. Gauntlet, at the last second, managed to armor his windpipe with yellow energy before Hyperthermia grabbed it. It saved his throat.

The rest of him suffered instead, as Gauntlet felt his whole body briefly cramp, and then all the muscles become exhausted, his legs no longer able to hold him. At the same time, his mouth went as dry as a bone. Dehydration. She'd turned it into a weapon.

"We're all alone." Hyperthermia said, looking down Gauntlet's face. Such a pretty girl…with such an ugliness implanted in her soul. "It can be under a car's engine block, or under someone's hand on a beach…but the end result is the same. We're alone."

"And I'm sorry you feel that way."

"…yeah. I'm sure you are." Hyperthermia said, and placed a finger on Gauntlet's forehead.

The metal claws clamped onto Hyperthermia's back, yanking the Genocide member off of Gauntlet. Normally, Scalpel could have thrown the girl across half the island. This time, he just managed to toss the girl fifteen feet before he collapsed, panting.

"Scalpel!" Gauntlet said, trying to fight through the cramps. "You took your sweet time!"

"Noted." Scalpel said. Gauntlet regretted his semi-joke. The alien did not look good. He'd been trying to hide, and fight through, the detrimental effects heat had on his species the whole fight, but it was all catching up to him,

"Awwwww…" Hyperthermia said, getting to her feet before Scalpel did. "What's wrong, alien? Feeling the heat?"

"…Ugh, of course. Can't think of anything snappy…head's killing me. Sooner we deal with you, the sooner I can go get a cold drink." Scalpel said, gesturing with his claws.

"I think the time for snappy remarks is past. It's time for snappy bones now." Gauntlet said, trying to get his muscles back into working order.

"Quite right. Come on then. Let's get to it." Scalpel said.

Hyperthermia held up a hand…and then dashed/flew instead, punching the alien directly in the face. Normally, the blow probably would have broken a few of her fingers. Scalpel's recoil from the heat turned made it far more effective.

"From the way the master talked-!" Hyperthermia said, spinning around and backhanding Scalpel, all of the alien's martial arts skill buried beneath a throbbing head and blurry vision. "I thought you'd actually be scary!"

Scalpel just tried to kick Hyperthermia. She dodged aside and responded with her own kick, causing the alien to lurch off and nearly lose his balance. Laughing, Hyperthermia closed it and began punching the alien's ears, Scalpel's clawing blows too slow and obvious to counter. Looking delighted with herself, Hyperthermia did a dramatic leap and lashed out her foot, kicking Scalpel in the face.

The alien lurched back, almost fell down…and then abruptly switched his momentum by lashing out with his arm, the weight of his claw pulling Scalpel out of his fall and forward. Hyperthermia touched down, even as the alien twisted his shoulder and plowed into her, the heat she was giving off making his head swim so bad he almost passed out.

Good thing he knew his species' equivalent of drunken boxing, as Hyperthermia had found out. The Genocide member hit the sand, and Scalpel lurch-threw himself down after her, using his falling momentum as he swung around to drive his elbow into her chest. He heard her breath explosively leave her lungs, but he did not feel ribs break. Inwardly, he cursed at the Lord's magical armor.

He did not curse Hyperthermia's screaming rage, as she was up and blasting. Between her rage and her need to squirm out from beneath the alien to aim the shot, she ended up hitting the sand immediately next to Scalpel instead of Scalpel himself. The sand-blast still sent him flying, and due to his fogged senses he nearly broke several bones in his messy landing. It was better then a direct strike: his alien blood would have likely made him explode.

"You know what? Fuck it. I'm sure the master will understand if I just bring back some BARBACUE." Hyperthermia said.

The Birdarang ricocheted off Hyperthermia's skull, the smoking, nearly cracked in half projectile landing in the sand nearby. This time, she didn't fall down, instead stumbling and grabbing her head.

"I'd worry about brain damage, but…really, do I need to finish this joke?" Gauntlet said, standing besides Robin (well, more accurately, being supported by Gauntlet-energies besides Robin).

"…you don't GET IT, do you?" Hyperthermia said, whirling around. "You think I'm stupid. I KNOW ALL ABOUT YOU! THE MASTER SPOKE FOR DAYS! I KNOW ALL YOU'VE DONE! EVERYONE YOU BEAT! You know what that says about me? You bring everything, and it's NOT ENOUGH! I told you the master made me perfect. All you've done, all your tricks, all your EXPERIENCE, and you're stumbling around like half-dead dogs while I have a few bumps and bruises! What does it say about you that the master can take someone like ME and make me SO MUCH BETTER?"

"He didn't trust someone smarter with the power." Gauntlet said.

"He didn't HAVE to." Hyperthermia said, heat shimmers blooming on her hands, even as her personal barrier kicked back into high gear, the sand sizzling beneath her. "Time to make like an M&M on a hot summer day, Titans."

"Sounds like someone needs s'more beating." Gauntlet said.

"…You-" Hyperthermia began, and then Robin hurled a disc. An explosive disc, the heat shield setting it off and vaporizing the shrapnel before it reached her. Coughing, Hyperthermia waved away the smoke.

"What are you…" Hyperthermia said, and then Robin hurled another explosive disc from her side, getting the same result. "Oh what is this, reefer psychology or something? Or are you trying to get me to pass out on smoke?"

Robin's response was to hurl another explosive disc…while Gauntlet touched down next to Scalpel.

"Sorry Nigel, don't know a gentle way to do this." Gauntlet said, and then seized Scalpel up with his power and dunked him in the nearby water, holding the alien under the cold, rushing water for a few seconds before pulling him out. "Sorry! How do you feel?"

"…all things considered? Smashing." Scalpel said. Blacktrinians may have drowned easily, but a brief period of time in the cold water had worked wonders for Scalpel's heat-weariness.

"Good, because we need a big one. I don't think we'll get a second chance." Gauntlet said, handing Scalpel his giant war hammer.

"We rarely do…wait, where did you get this?" Scalpel said.

"E-Hammer. Their delivery service is AWESOME.'

"RARRGGHHHH!" Hyperthermia yelled, finally having lost her temper and barraging Robin with heat blasts. The Titan leader did a backflip storm to avoid all the shots, the last two finally erupting too close and sending him tumbling further down the beach. Panting, Hyperthermia floated up several inches and flew over to Robin, who had gotten back up. With two smooth motions, he produced his staff and blade.

"…you're kidding, right? You want to fight me hand to hand. I was NICE on your bastard friends, and THEY HAVE POWERS. What do you have?"

"Eleven solid years training. The best father and brother a man could have. A 152 IQ. And the fact that if I really wanted to, I could have killed you twenty different ways by now before you even realized you were dead. Oh, and the fact that I didn't resort to that." Robin said. "You can fly, throw heat, and do some wind tricks. Big whoop. You know what I REALLY have?"

"What?" Hyperthermia said.

She never heard Scalpel coming. Only the slight whistling sound of his hammer made her turn around. By then, it was too late.

"Them." Robin said.

Scalpel landed nearby…and hit the beach with his war hammer in the fiercest, hardest arc he could. A giant wave of sand exploded up from the slashing impact. Hyperthermia took a step back in surprise…

The sand fell on her, and just how badly Hyperthermia had underestimated her stamina levels came screaming to the forefront of her mind. At full strength she would have vaporized the sand. ALL of the sand. At her current strength, her instinctive protective heat surged out…and promptly melted most of the sand to glass instead. Smoking, molten glass clumps, which promptly splattered all over her body.

Hyperthermia found out another downside to her stamina level. It kept her from ignoring the heat in solid objects.

She was on fire. Suddenly, after feeling as cool as a breeze the whole fight, she was on fire, a hundred brands searing into her. She thrashed and screamed, the glass sticking to her outfit and beginning to melt through the magical protection, which didn't do anything for the heat it was projecting, she was on fire, she was burning, she was under the car again and there was no escape…

Gauntlet's energy hand surged out, semi-grabbing Hyperthermia and forming a very carefully designed tube-like structure around her. Robin leapt in, and Hyperthermia's final scream was swallowed as he hurled the freezing disc into the mold. It detonated, and in a flash of blue light, Hyperthermia went from hot to cold, trapped in a mass of solid ice.

"I also have the fact that you control heat, not create it. Which you'd need to be conscious for. So, stuck in there? You're a man on the street." Robin said.

"Or maybe she's a man in the yard. Or just the yard. Because we stomped her." Gauntlet said, and withdrew his power…and, as a last action, dumped a bunch of objects on the ground. Scalpel and Robin glanced at them, having forgotten Gauntlet's bad (and reaching) joke. Blobs of glass. At the last split second, while holding her, he'd pulled all the burning orbs from her form.

"…it would be bad to freeze her with molten glass on her. All sorts of problems." Gauntlet said, and relaxed as best he could. The plan Robin had told him an eternity ago had finally lined up. Considering the three Titan men could still walk under their own power after fighting a Lord servant, it had gone pretty well.

"You really are a sucker for a pretty face."

"Good thing I wasn't dealing with one today. I might have pulled my punches." Gauntlet said.

"Amen." Robin said, as he put away his weapons and did a very brief stretch. He had a feeling tanning was ruined for him for the rest of his life.

"She'll be all right in there, right?" Gauntlet said, looking at the frozen statue his enemy had become.

"Fries is a lunatic, but his skill in cryonics is second to none. When he doesn't want something to die, it doesn't." Robin said, adjusting his cape and belt. "She's in stasis. Will wake up soaked with a nasty headache, in a few hours."

"We should get going." Scalpel said.

"You know, I'd just like to say, I love how modern science is indistinguishable from magic." Gauntlet said.

"I've EXPLAINED the science, Gauntlet. You just preferred catching new game-monsters to listening." Robin said in a light tone.

"You used the words quantum six times. That means it's just technobabble."

"When Pangloss tried to explain the inner workings of your weapon, he used the words 'drawing upon ethereal energy of the 9th dimension'." Scalpel commented.

"Exactly. Magic."

"Or more babble." Gauntlet said. "Now, let's go beat up another member of the Lord's loony bin. If we can do that, we'll forever have one up on all the girls."

"You're just saying that because you're not sleeping with any of them." Scalpel said, his tone as dry as he felt.

"ESPECIALLY that fact." Gauntlet said, rubbing his hands together in exaggerated malicious joy. "…wait a second. Why was I so specific about the girls?"

* * *

It was strange, the things you remembered in crisis situations. At the moment, even as the backhand crashed against his face, Beast Boy was remembering being lectured by his mother.

Well, his second mother. Rita Farr, aka Elasti-Girl of the Doom Patrol. In the halcyon days of Beast Boy's youth, before a greater need for independence broke him away from them and to his current team, long before Beast Boy had expanded his knowledge of animals to thousands instead of a few dozen, he had become mad that Cliff Steele, the second Robotman, wouldn't teach him how to fight. That was bad enough, but Rita had scolded him for it. When he protested that the bad guys knew how to fight, Rita had replied that that was because they were bad guys and that they had to be better.

Beast Boy didn't really understand until later why bad guys being able to fight better was a bad thing. The truth was, you could learn all the martial arts in the world, but getting them to work was another thing (One had to keep in mind that, when constantly interacting with superhumans, it became far too easy to attribute their actions against what normal people could and would do). Good people, half the time, would have no idea how to make any skills they learned work for them in a fight. Bad people, on the other hand, constantly got into fights. They did this because they tended to have little impulse control and little to no empathy, and hence _thought _little of trying to solve all their problems by hitting them. By (non) virtue of this fact, they became very good at fighting. They also tended to be criminals, thugs, and worse. To aspire to that was either idiocy, sociopathy, or the misconstrued conceptions of a child.

Or, perhaps, a tragedy. Who knew what choices had set Carcinogen on his path? Whatever they were, like so many others, they had made him very good at fighting. Beast Boy's nearly broken nose and cheek were testament to that. He staggered back and nearly fell down, and then Carcinogen punched him in the face again. This time, he did fall down.

"You ca' do really much 'o anyt'ing, can you?" Carcinogen said.

Beast Boy got to his feet, putting his hands into a boxing stance.

Carcinogen half smirked and half-sneered. "Ya still crawny, Titan." He said, putting his own hands up. Beast Boy's immediate punch was blocked, and Carcinogen slammed his own fist into Beast Boy's forehead. The changeling's vision swam, and then all the air left his lungs as Carcinogen kicked him in the chest. Falling to the hard rocks again, Beast Boy rolled out of the way from a stomping boot, but not far away enough to avoid the toe of Carcinogen's other foot impacting with the side of his face. Pain exploded through Beast Boy's whole skull, and he barely managed to complete his roll and get back to a semi-vertical base. Carcinogen helped him out by laughing.

"C'mon boy. Gonna teach you to sing." The Jamaican said.

"And I'm going to teach you what a concussion feels like! Spoiler Alert: it hurts like a bitch!" Beast Boy spat out through a mouthful of blood.

"Neat. It'll be like a trade." Carcinogen said, and lunged back in. Beast Boy blocked the blow directed at his face, but it left him open for the knee Carcinogen drove into his torso. Spinning around, Carcinogen backhanded the Titan, knocking him to the ground once more. More blood sprayed from the impact.

"Want to try again with da taunt? C'mon boy, gonna teach you to sing."

"…Greg Cipes already taught me that!" Beast Boy rasped.

"…I don't get it."

"COME GET _SOME_!" Beast Boy yelled, charging forward and swinging out his fist. Carcinogen laughed and sidestepped, and when Beast Boy whirled around the Genocide member lashed out with his own fist.

This time, Beast Boy dodged. Seizing the Jamaican's wrist, he immediately turned around and inserted himself into Carcinogen's personal space, yanking downward on the arm and flipping the larger man over onto his back. The Jamaican crashed down heavily, even as Beast Boy twisted his stance and kicked the Genocide member upside the head as hard as he could before springing away.

Carcinogen, much to Beast Boy's discomfort, rolled with the kick himself, getting back up in two seconds. At least his lip was now bloody.

"Sneaky little _jinnal!_"

"I'm sorry, you said something about being men? Because I swear I just heard a baby." Beast Boy said.

"Make _YOU _cry, boy." Carcinogen snapped, and stalked in to resume the fistfight.

Morgue's rotund form, meanwhile, was tumbling from an explosive blast, the girl managing to stop on her back and aiming at the cloud of smoke. The Snark that emerged was blown apart, and the Boojums behind it fired on empty rock, Morgue scattering her form into the bat-mass and frantically seeking cover. Two bats died to Flutter-Bye fire before Morgue reformed behind another tall rock, hissing through her teeth. She couldn't keep this up much longer. Eventually, she was going to start losing muscle mass, if not bone material, and then she'd be crippled and hence a sitting duck.

Gunfire and sonic blasts hammered against Morgue's cover. The undertaker tried to block it out and run data through her head. Number of enemies remaining. The battle area. Her own speed based on factors like terrain, stamina, and pain endurance…

The Boojums focused fire, their sonic cannons blowing apart the rock. Morgue was already moving and firing at the ground, kicking up more and more dust that swallowed her. The robots veered back and began switching to alternate modes of tracking…which Morgue threw off by hurling a chaff grenade up out of the smoke. The heated shards of aluminum flooded the Wonderland robots with targets, and they immediately veered away to attempt to re-calibrate their vision and establish a parameter.

Morgue crouched down in her dust cloud (it seemed the great minds of the Titans thought alike), quickly removing her cloak. Slipping her hand inside a concealed pocket, she withdrew a small black bag with an electronic circuit woven into its seal. Morgue knew that this would be the last card she could draw from beneath her sleeve, but it was as wild as they came. Inside the bag were special micro-explosives Cyborg had developed, originally planning to use them for large-scale vehicle disabling. In the end, the Titan had been unable to come up with a proper distribution system and scrapped the idea, but he'd still had a batch of the developed micro-bombs. Sophie had appropriated them for herself before the fight, just in case. With no backup coming her way and Morgue in no mood to die by a thousand cuts, their time was now.

She, unlike Cyborg, DID have a distribution system, and tore the bag open. Inside, the explosives armed.

The Wonderland robots began returning, some firing into the cloud. There was a moment's pause as the robots searched for target data, based on what had come before and their blind shots…

The fact that they were robots kept any amusing expressions from crossing their faces from what DID happen.

Bats erupted from the cloud, scattering every which way. In their tiny clawed feet were clutched even smaller explosives. Explosives that also had a magnetic aspect. Frantically, the relatively-simple AI's of the flying machines tried to adjust to this bizarre new tactic…

Savior barely heard the explosions. He was too busy ramming his knee into the side of the Marchare. The blow barely registered to the robot, but the Shimmer that emerged from the limb did, boring into the robot and tearing its head apart from within. His power might not have recovered in time to protect him from the buzz saw, but in this case, Noel would forgive a delay of a few seconds. Mainly because he was too busy throwing the broken Marchare off of his person and rolling away from the Haber-Dasher who tried to impale its bladed staff into Savior's head.

The burning sensation that erupted from Savior's arms as he forced the Shimmer out ran all the way down to the base of his spine. The power hadn't quite yet recovered from the blade…but Noel hadn't lived as long as he had without learning how to compensate. The Shimmer knocked the Haber-Dasher away before retracting to Savior, stealing the bladed staff in the process. Whirling around, Savior blocked another Haber-Dasher's slash, and then briefly sent out the Shimmer again, knocking the wire-robot away in turn and stealing its weapon as well. Blades in both hands, Savior whirled around briefly before striking a pose, the remaining Haber-Dashers and Marchares settling down around him.

"Okay then. Who wants to have their existential crisis first?" Savior said, and then the Haber-Dashers leapt at him as one.

Carcinogen's fist swung over Beast Boy's head, and his second just barely missed the green Titan's face as he jerked back. Beast Boy threw up his hands, and then kicked Carcinogen in the shin. The yell the Genocide member produced didn't make up for the jab that caught Beast Boy in the ear, though Beast Boy managed to duck under the sweeping hook that followed it. When Carcinogen turned around, Beast Boy popped him in the mouth. It only made Carcinogen pop HIM in the mouth in turn, and considerably harder.

"…so den. What be the score? I think 84-3? Even for you heroes, dat's bad numbers. Bad all around." Carcinogen said, wiping his mouth. Beast Boy slowly pushed himself up. His face and neck was stained red with blood, and his right eye was well on its way to being swollen shut. Beast Boy's only response was to put up his hands again. Carcinogen snorted.

"Cha. Beginning t'see why the Lord so vexed with yo Titans. Starting to wear me nerves too." Carcinogen said, and then feinted to the left. To his immense surprise, Beast Boy didn't fall for it, dodging his punch and catching Carcinogen in the forehead with his own. Unfortunately, this made the Titan withdraw his hand with a yelp (skulls tended to be hard), and Carcinogen promptly smashed him in the mouth again. This time, Beast Boy stayed on his feet. To Carcinogen's even greater annoyance, he dodged the Genocide member's next punch and darted around him, swapping the pair's positions and putting Carcinogen's back to his wall of acidic mist.

"Slippery." Carcinogen said. Beast Boy made another taunting gesture. Carcinogen smirked and swooped back in.

Beast Boy tried another takedown with Carcinogen's punch, only for the Jamaican to pull free and crack Beast Boy on the back of the head with a clubbing blow. Fortunately, it mostly glanced, allowing Beast Boy to bury his own fist into Carcinogen's gut. To his alarm, Carcinogen didn't seem to feel it at all. That got him a punch to the jaw so hard Beast Boy nearly passed out from the pain.

"You ever wunda how you gonna die? I been there. Not what ya expect, is it?" Carcinogen said, cracking his sore knuckles. "At least I got screwed. You? You struggle 'n struggle, and die chokin' on y'own teeth. No wonder d'Lord dislikes you heroes so. You offensive."

Beast Boy said nothing. He just stared at the Genocide member for several long seconds…and then lifted his fists, swaying on his feet.

"Iidiat, too." Carcinogen said, and darted in.

Beast Boy spun away from his punch…and his form rippled and expanded, transforming into a bear. Carcinogen's eyes went as wide as saucers, but that was all he had time to do…

Eyes. That was what did it. When Beast Boy had shifted forms to sneak-attack, his skull and tissues had reformatted…and his deeply suffering vision, caused by his blackened eyes, had abruptly shifted and clarified. It reminded Beast Boy why he didn't get into fights as his normal, handsome self. It caused unexpected issues like that, things which threw him off. Which meant instead of knocking Carcinogen into next week, he just knocked him ass over elbows backwards, the Genocide member tumbling violently before his final crash landing. Beast Boy shrank back to his normal state, his damaged eyes widening as much as they could.

Carcinogen lay there a moment, and then he began laughing. Green mist began leaking from the wound Beast Boy had stuck, and then his whole body.

"OH HA! DIS IS NEW! You cheated, right before _I _was about to cheat! Hah! Sick." Carcinogen said. "T'ank you, now I don't halfa feel bad!"

Beast Boy ran for his life, turning into a snow leopard and fleeing as the Genocide member got up, corrosive green gas erupted from Carcinogen's form again as he opened fire. The blast scoured away the rock; Beast Boy's retreat apparently caught the Genocide member by surprise. He'd expected another desperate (and futile) attack.

"But a wha di rass! COME BACK HERE!" Carcinogen yelled, firing explosive gas bombs. Somehow, Beast Boy dodged them all, scampering to the top of the hill and vanishing over it a second before Carcinogen melted it to slag. His eyes narrowing, Carcinogen ran up after him, not turning to gas in case the Titan had some alien animal up his sleeve that could burp really hard, or something.

Beyond the hill…lay the beach. By divine (or perhaps not) providence, each of the Titans had found their battles culminating there. Carcinogen didn't know that, of course. He just knew the changeling was nowhere to be seen. There weren't even tracks in the sand.

"The FUCK?" Carcinogen said, jumping down to the sand and crouching briefly. Maybe a bird form? Carcinogen glanced to the sky…

Then the green whale loomed out from beneath the tides, its shadow falling over the Genocide member as Beast Boy erupted from the sea. Carcinogen jerked his eyes towards it, just before Beast Boy's blue/green whale slammed down onto the water from his leap, sending a crashing surge of inky blue rising up and looming over Carcinogen.

On instinct, the Genocide member blasted it. It didn't take him long to realize that giant walls of water really didn't care if you shot them with acidic smoke.

The liquid hit him like a hammer, smashing him into the sand and driving him beneath its midst. Carcinogen tumbled, struggling to find the surface and break. Under water, he was vulnerable. Moving through liquid as a normal person removed most of their mobility; trying to do it as a gas was even more of a bad idea. It was why he hadn't turned into his cloud state to protect himself to begin with. Where was the goddamn SURFACE…

The white lines shot out, and with a yell of surprise, Carcinogen found himself dragged with the wave, pulled past the immediate shore and deeper into the sea beyond the island. Carcinogen barely got a chance to right himself before Savior punched him in the face.

_On the island, strewn across nearly a square mile, were the shattered remains of many robots. The rabbit hole had been filled in, and Savior and Morgue had gone to deal with the other pest. Beast Boy had seen them, briefly, just before he'd tried his failed bear attack. The two had taken a long route around to keep Carcinogen from spotting them, and met Beast Boy on the beach beyond…_

Carcinogen, to his credit, clamped his mouth shut and cut loose with his power, but beneath the water, his fatal attack was turned into a scattered rush that Savior's Shimmer constructs easily carried him away from. A green dolphin darted from the side, smashing Carcinogen's face with his tail, and rapidly swam away before Carcinogen could counter-attack. In truth, Beast Boy could have been in his normal form and gotten away, as the Genocide member's gas blasts lost virtually all their speed and pressure under the water, barely blooming out at all before they started floating to the surface. Carcinogen wanted to scream, but he couldn't, he had no more air already, he needed AIR…

But the white tendril lines refused to release him, and the changeling was darting back in and bashing his head with his tail again. For the first time, fear flooded into the Genocide member. He couldn't breathe, and he couldn't break free, but if he turned into gas underwater he'd be at the mercy of the water's motion, it would be like moving through thick molasses at best, and he'd have to account for every tiny molecule of himself or he'd materialize with water inside his skull or lungs or spine, but he needed AIR HE COULDN'T BREATHE-!

The Jamaican's body disintegrated, the toxins searing into the Shimmer as Carcinogen threw caution to the wind and desperately tried to get back up above the water in his gaseous state. His only relief was, in this form, he didn't need air.

It was not enough, as he had done EXACTLY what Sophie had planned. Savior grimaced at the pain, but he endured it as he shifted his Shimmer's design and went to work.

Carcinogen found his upward escape cut off as soon as it started, as Savior began spinning the immediate water around him into a thrashing whirlpool, Carcinogen caught up in the liquid and unable to escape. Every sense of equilibrium left the Jamaican. He had no idea which way was up, where his arms and feet were, where ANY of himself was, the separation between water and gas threatening to break down entirely. His sentience strained to try and comprehend what was going on, and failed. He was caught, he was suffocating, he wanted to scream, he wanted to escape, but there was no escape…

None, save the darkness.

The gas abruptly contracted into Carcinogen's limp form, the Jamaican having passed out from the experience. He floated for a moment before white lines seized him again, Beast Boy and Savior making their way back to shore.

Morgue met the pair as they emerged, Savior dragging the Genocide member onto the sand.

"He's not breathing." Savior said, putting the Jamaican down. Holding out his hand, Savior let his talent flow out and down Carcinogen's throat, pumping the water out and expanding the air passages. Beast Boy watched him as he worked…

Remembering…

After several seconds Carcinogen surged up, coughing violently. His bleary eyes blinked open.

"Huh?"

Beast Boy punched the man so hard he broke a finger in the process. Carcinogen's head hit the sand, and he did not rise again.

"Who's the man now, boy?" Beast Boy said, before falling onto his rear. He was suddenly very tired. He also had the feeling that _Rocky _movies were ruined for him for the rest of his life.

"ME! I thought of the whole plan you two just pulled off!" Morgue said, putting her hands on her hips.

"…she's got you there, B." Savior said, standing up after confirming Carcinogen was unconscious. Walking over, he offered Beast Boy a hand.

The Titan stared at it. Remembered…

_Of a position so much like the one Noel had assumed over Carcinogen._

_Of a dull blade._

_Of an encroaching, searing pain and bitter cold…_

What Beast Boy would have done would never truly be known, as Morgue yelled and whirled around. Savior did likewise, as the last legion of Marchares appeared on the top of the hillside that Beast Boy had fled over. Cloaking devices, it seemed. One that had even concealed the dull glows of a dozen-plus arm cannons all aimed at the three Titans…

The sonic blast wave struck the robots. Even in his semi-protected position, the attack nearly threw Savior off his feet. The Shimmer formed plugs in his ears even as more lines surged out to grab and protect Beast Boy and Morgue. The Marchares were not so lucky; instead of being thrown, the precisely sonic force literally rattled them apart, the pieces flying over the three Titans in a storm of debris. After a few seconds of metal rain, the sea was once again quiet.

"…well, on the plus side, I no longer have a crick in my neck." Savior said, standing up when the shattered robots and sonic blast stopped coming. "You all right Gar?"

"Hey. No normal names in the field, Savior." Cyborg said, his supercharged sonic cannon splitting back into a normal hand as he appeared on the hilltop.

"Cy!" Beast Boy said, pulling himself out of the Shimmer and bounding over as a rabbit.

"Yeah, sorry about that. Getting into hot water tends to be worse for me than the average person." Cyborg said, tapping his head. "System's cleared out and rebooted now, and I've redone my personal defenses to cut that option off. Just in time to get _YOU _out of hot water."

"I dislike interrupting reunions…!" Morgue called, Savior turning his gaze when she spoke. The rotund heroine was hovering over Carcinogen's unconscious form, one weapon aimed at his face. "But we need an option if he wakes up."

Dark energy abruptly manifested over the Jamaican, covering him in a semi-dome that doubled as a shroud of sorts. Morgue blinked behind her mask.

"Noted and handled." Raven said, appearing through more darkness. "Let's go, guys. We've worn out the Lord's welcome."

* * *

"Is everyone all right?" Starfire asked. The Titans had reassembled, and Raven had fixed the injuries they'd sustained. In the end, none of the groups of three had been in time to assist the others, but Terra and Gauntlet weren't complaining.

"More or less." Robin said, finishing his own check of his utility belt. Raven turned her head to look at the still-distant Etemenanki, but it gave no indication of firing again.

"All right, so we've handed the clone minions, the robot minions, and the gullible minions. What's next? Vampire minions? Zombie minions? Fishmen minions?" Gauntlet said. "Or have we made him mad enough to come out so we can get to pushing _his _face in?"

"Somehow, if getting through three rounds of his defenses didn't make him mad enough to come out, I doubt anything will." Robin said, assessing the black citadel. "We're going to have to take the fight to him."

"I can get behind that." Cyborg said, re-arming his cannon.

"I also see its appeal." Starfire echoed.

"Did anyone bring a map? I have a feeling the inside of that place is going to make MC Esher look like Ozzie and Harriet." Gauntlet said.

"How do you even KNOW about that sitcom?" Savior said.

None of the other Titans noticed the very slight pause in Gauntlet's response, but Raven did. She'd sent what it meant mirrored in how Beast Boy had hesitated in taking Savior's hand. The marks of change. The Titans had fought as well as they ever had…but even that wasn't enough to drive it away. She also knew that there was nothing she could do to change it. Not any more.

"Cable TV and spare time."

"That could probably serve as an answer to most questions in life. Can we get moving? I dislike standing on this island. Feels like my Achilles' are constantly being gnawed on." Terra said, hopping up onto one of her ocean rocks.

"Raven?" Robin asked.

"Yes, let's get moving. Swiftly." Raven said, taking in all her friends a brief moment more.

_Who's going to die?_

"So, does anyone want to venture what's coming up next?" Morgue asked, as the Titans fell in behind Robin and Raven and sped towards Etemenanki.

"If I was in charge, I'd throw something psychological at us." Savior said.

"I'd throw up a heavy pure defense. Wear us down more trying to get through it." Scalpel said.

"I'd just open the door. He likes to pull the whole 'I already enacted my master plan' thing, so why wait to brag?" Gauntlet said.

"Can we please not give our insane and powerful enemy any ideas?" Terra said.

"Even if he could hear us, I doubt he would take suggestions from us, friend Terra." Starfire said. "The bile runs far too deep."

"Why doesn't that comfort me…" Beast Boy said.

"I hope it never does." Cyborg said. "We-"

Raven stopped on a dime, holding out her arm. All the Titans immediately followed suit.

"Survey says?" Gauntlet said.

The black object launched out from within the twisting mass of Etemenanki, the energy patterns slashing away from it as it arced into the air.

"None of the above. Guys?" Robin said, getting his weapons ready, his last word directed towards Raven and Cyborg.

"It's not a bomb." Cyborg said, having run a series of immediate scans.

"It's not any kind of weapon." Raven said, drawing her cloaks around her. "It's a delivery system."

"Delivering what?" Savior said, bringing several Shimmer weapons to the bear.

The dark mass smashed down into the rock thirty feet from the Titans, smoke and dust consuming its impact point. The Titans began to spread out again, weapons and powers at the ready.

"…you." Raven said.

"Me." Came an odd response. The voice had a human cadence, but the underscore was more distinctive, a humming buzz that sounded part mechanical and part insectile. "It's nice to see you again, Titans. For the third time, for the last time."

"…If you're trying to quote _Spaceballs_, let me assure you that you suck at it." Gauntlet said.

"Oh no…not a film…" The voice said.

The force wave that came from within the smoke immediately blasted it to nothing. Despite all the Titans' preparation, the power of the wave made them all take one step back (at least, and in Terra's case, nearly knocked her flat on her ass).

"…You're not Daniel." Raven said, the figure now fully exposed, one arm held aloft.

"No. No I'm not." The form replied. Robin took the man in, and a faint prickle of recognition triggered along his spine.

"…shit." Savior said. Gauntlet stared at the man. Standing at least six and a half feet tall, he wore no clothing. Instead, his body was covered in what looked like a cross between wires, metal, and resin, the mass of it twisted and tangled around every spec of skin besides his upper neck and head. Dark veins ran up the exposed anterior triangles, which stood in contrast to the incandescent energies that blazed in the man's eyes, power that was mirrored in his long, perfectly gold blonde hair. His fingers made faint, odd cracking noises as he moved them, and the man-thing gave the Titans a slight smirk, sparks of glowing power flying off his hair as he did so.

"Um, yeah. That guy." Gauntlet said. Scalpel gave the comedian a sidelong glance. Gauntlet grinned sheepishly and then settled back into a combat pose. Raven, in the meantime, gave Robin her own sidelong glance, having detected the spark of recognition.

"Nester Weames." Robin said. The same spark echoed across all the other Titans who hadn't recognized the young man. It was hard to: beyond facial structure and hair, everything about the power-hungry super villain 'aspirant' had been changed.

"Come now Robin. I show you respect. Use my name. _MY_ name now." Nester said.

"…Torment." Raven said. Her word dropped the last puzzle piece in for Gauntlet. The Lord had found another human being, hurt and broken, desperate for power. And he'd remade him in the image of the Titans' very first great foe. The foe that had made sure Titans' Tower was on an island…because he'd been the one who had ravaged the mainland so much that the ocean had rushed in to fill the void.

"So it cycles back to this, Titans. Old and true, together at last." Nester/Torment said.

"This isn't a game, Weames. Your master will butcher his way across this planet. You really want that?" Raven said.

"I'm not opposed." Torment said.

"You always were a selfish little shit." Savior said.

"You would know that well." Torment said. "Wouldn't you? Weakling?"

Raven felt the explosion of anger come from her lover, but to his credit he stayed where he was.

"Some things change, Weames. Daniel Neithercut was a tormented kid and we were at half our strength and a millionth our experience. This will only end one way." Robin said.

Torment's only response was for his smile to widen, showing perfect white teeth.

Only Cyborg really saw what Torment did, blurring up into the sky at horrendous speed. Even he was not fast enough to shout a warning before the mechanized warrior came down, smashing into the ground with a thunderous impact, the island stone literally rippling outward from his body and thrusting itself upward into the air like impaling swords. The Titans were washed over by the destructive passage, scattering and stabilizing themselves as best they could on the ground's drastically altered face. With one smooth move, Torment flipped upward from his crouch and landed on a particularly tall spire of rock, dark and brilliant energies surging across his form.

"Not the way you think." Torment said, stalks of metal blooming from his shoulders and back. The points glowed, and then six devastating cutting lasers slashed out across the battlefield, carving through anything in their path like it wasn't there.

* * *

A world away, Ryce's right eye snapped open.

"…shit."

* * *

Deep within the depths, another voice spoke.

"_**All sciences are now under the obligation to prepare the ground for the future task of the philosopher, which is to solve the problem of value, to determine the true hierarchy of value…**_

"_**Ah…**_

"_**There we go."**_


	5. Unbreakable

Chapter 5: Unbreakable

"_It is said that power corrupts, but actually it__'__s more true that power attracts the corruptible. The sane are usually attracted by other things than power.__"_

-David Brin

_**Human misery drives everything.**_

_**Not the weak kind, the kind felt by the starving and the disenfranchised. The misery of the ambitious, the burning need to have MORE. Never knowing satisfaction or contentment, only seeking MORE. It's what drove Caesar to turn Rome from a democracy to an empire. It's what caused Lenin and Trotsky's worker revolution to turn into Stalin's dictatorship. It's why that, despite all his losses, and despite the fact he's probably smart enough to realize he will never win where it counts, Lex Luthor continues his futile opposition against Superman. Enough is never enough. To be happy with what you have is seen as the mark of a lesser.**_

_**It's disgusting, but understandable. It's a desire bred so deep into sentient minds that they will reach out with it at the most unlikely of times.**_

_**Daniel Neithercut was a weak soul. His father Thorton probably fancied that Daniel would be like Michael Corleone, someone who rose to the occasion when the time was right. Perhaps it might have been true…but Thorton Neithercut had no real sense of timing.**_

_**If he had, he might have reacted differently, in his war with the Crimson Queen. In the fires of their war, in a crumbling metropolis called Jump City, the Titans were born. So was something else.**_

_What it was called, in layman's terms, translated to something like the Eye of Azeroth. While the magical dimension had been unable to save itself from Trigon, the Eye had ensured he did not accomplish his ultimate goal of absorbing all its power. Left with a broken homeland, Raven had crossed realms to come to Earth, and Jump City, bringing the Eye with her. She had met those who would become her dearest friends. In meeting them, she had left the Eye unguarded._

_Before it was the Tower, it was Silas' Stone personal laboratory. It was where the man had converted his son into the cyborg form that would become his namesake, and it was where the fledgling Titans had gathered to recuperate from the strife that had engulfed Jump City on that fateful week. It was where Raven had left the Eye._

_It was where Thorton had brought Daniel, the horrors of war having nearly destroyed him, to demand Silas do for him what he'd done for his own son. Thorton Neithercut had brought his men. His men had brought crateloads of high-tech weapons in two trucks they never got to unload._

_Daniel had brought a rage and hatred long buried that, upon realizing his father would rather him live as a freak than die in peace, finally exploded through him. The Eye had reacted in turn, summoned by Daniel's emotional storm. The power of the Eye remade Daniel. The weapons of his father completed him. Daniel Neithercut died, and Torment was born._

_Had the five heroes not been there, all of Jump City would have consumed in the child's pain, the same way it had devoured his father and his men, as well as shattering Silas Stone's lab. They had held the villain back as best they could, even as those who had not already fled Jump during the chaotic week did their best to make up for lost time. They had known they did not have the strength to beat him, but they did not run. Later, Beast Boy claimed the only reason he hadn't was because he thought Robin knew what he was doing, and otherwise he would have fled. Robin had replied that Beast Boy was selling himself short. He had not told Beast Boy that he was making it up as he went along, and had been mortally terrified by the time the battle reached the halfway point._

_Ultimately, the Titans had not won. Torment had defeated himself. The anger and rage that had made him so overwhelming ultimately overwhelmed __**him**__. The gem had overloaded, and the Titans had been carried away by Raven before the tragic villain's own energies incinerated both himself and nearly a third of Jump City. Some would later say the Titans had allowed Torment to explode, his death destroying the rotting slums and ghettos that had been a bane on the coastal town. The Titans generally responded that a fairly large chunk of the then-downtown had also been damaged beyond repair in the blast and would have to be torn down, not to mention the fallout had turned half of Jump City's nearby forest into desert and damaged the immediate continental shelf so badly that it had been reduced to below sea level, causing the Atlantic Ocean to surge in to fill the void. There were better ways to stop urban decay._

_The Titans had not thought of those things then. At the time, they could only stare at the destruction they had escaped. The only building that ultimately survived was Silas Stone's lab, build on the then-outskirts of Jump, on a higher plane of rock, and possessing a personal force field Silas had built to protect against such threats as these (Silas had been concerned about gang warfare going high-tech and its consequences; he'd been correct, albeit not in the way he'd anticipated) that Cyborg had activated to protect his injured father. As the water rushed in, further breakdowns in the damaged rock shelf ultimately left the battered lab on a new island. As if the water had washed away Jump City's sins and given it a second chance._

_Silas had died that night. In time, his lab had become the Tower. The five had become the Titans._

_**And so things come full circle. **_

_**Nester Weames is not Daniel Neithercut…he's better. Neithercut was a shrieking baby. Weames has AMBITION. Small, but easy to offer and even easier to manipulate. And he had a grudge, one that's been quite useful in undermining any apprehensions he might have in his destiny. The Titans made him miserable, and now it shall be turned back on them. What made them what they are, all those years ago, will play a role, if not the role, in tearing them asunder.**_

_**It's funny…what usually dooms the ambitious, those who can never have enough, is hubris.**_

_**But hubris is not limited to those who seek the heavens.**_

_**It strikes those who claim to serve them as well.**_

* * *

Cyborg knew his job well.

Back in the old days, when it was just the five of them, he'd been the bruiser, the tank. Robin directed, Beast Boy improvised, Starfire blasted, Raven manipulated, and he charged. He took the hits that his teammates might not take as well. Things had changed over the years, with the expanding team and talent pool they had access to, but Cyborg always did his best to live up to the intent of those early days. He was the man of metal, the one who had already denied death its claim. That fact, which had once filled him with loathing, had transformed over the years into a point of pride.

Then the Lord had tried to take him off the game table entirely, and with such a shopworn cliché as water. The worst part was that it had worked. Cyborg had steeled himself for magical tricks, electromagnetic pulses, and all sorts of other, more unusual destructive forces, but he'd overlooked just how effective the classics could be. Not enough for the Lord to put him down for good, but long enough that his teammates had been in mortal danger while he'd laid on the ground like a glorified paperweight.

It was time to make up for lost time. Jets ignited in Cyborg's backpack and boots, and he surged up between Torment's destructive laser stream and aimed directly at his face with his sonic cannon.

Torment's destroying blasts shut off, his gaze falling on the lone Titan.

Cyborg immediately spun to the side and fully kicked in his jets, his sonic cannon transforming back into a fist. He'd expected a counter of this type and planned for it. Rather than shoot Torment, he would knock his block off before he could further adapt.

It all worked up until the block-knocking part. Instead, Cyborg's fist slammed into Torment's hand.

"Ah, creative as ever, aren't we Victor?" Torment said. Cyborg's organic eye narrowed.

"You don't get to call me that." Cyborg said. His shoulders split open, the secondary sonic cannons arming and firing in half a second. Torment was gone before they did, his form blurring away.

"And why not, Victor? I thought you hated being a cyborg! Wouldn't it seem better if you were addressed by your god-given name?" Torment said, now floating off to Cyborg's side.

"That was a long time ago. I changed." Cyborg said, before he primed his classic arm cannon and swung it towards his enemy. "And you, Weames? Haven't changed a bit."

The sonic blast just struck air again, but Cyborg had expected that. Throwing his tracking computers into overdrive, he tried to pin down the form of the Lord's last defense.

"Really?" Torment said, abruptly right in Cyborg's face.

Cyborg immediately introduced him to his fully-charged sonic cannon, the whitish-blue blast streaking across the dark island sky.

The fact that it managed to knock Torment back ten or so feet instead of just being completely ignored did little to cheer the Titan.

"Still want to make that assessment? Vic?" Torment said, and then countered with his own blazing red blast.

Cyborg stood his ground in turn. _HE _didn't move an inch. From the pain that crashed through his body, he somewhat regretted that choice.

"…don't see…why it should…change." Cyborg said, grimacing. Torment just smirked.

Scalpel's leaping warhammer strike impacted against the Genocide member's forearm, Torment having raised the limb to block without even looking. Despite that fact, Cyborg roared back in, throwing his own punch. Torment blocked it with his other hand.

Starfire's shining blast was met by Torment's own, the metal spines lighting up and firing out a merged shot that stopped the Starbolt stream dead in its tracks. He glanced behind himself at the alien.

"Trying to shoot me in the back. That's not very heroic of you." Torment said, and then spun like a tornado, knocking his enemies away and flashing his lasers across the sky. Cyborg and Scalpel fell to the ground with shuddering crashes, and Starfire was forced to retreat from the laser storm. No sooner did Torment stop his spin than dark energies rippled down his arms.

"Then again, you always _were _a bunch of disappointments!" Torment said, and then his hands transformed into gatling-like cannons, burning bullets exploding across the island and driving back Savior, Beast Boy, and Morgue before they could follow up their teammates' attacks with their own.

The metal bo staff that cracked over the back of Torment's head interrupted his fire. Torment turned around to get the length of it jammed into his forehead. The blow was not strong enough to knock him back, which ended up working against him. Robin, being directly in his face, was also inside his firing range, and he took full advantage by wailing on Torment while the Genocide member flailed about, only able to retaliate at first by swinging his gun-arms in wide arcs that Robin easily ducked under.

"Oh what is this? Really? _REALLY?_" Torment said, before a wave of force erupted off his body and drove Robin back across the sky. "Nice combo, Robin! I think it moved a few hairs out of place!"

Robin just spun back up to his feet. Torment smirked as his back-spires lit up.

"Should have realized it by now, Robin! It sucks just being a guy off the street!"

The gas bomb came down and impacted on Torment's shoulder, Robin having tossed it up into the air as he was thrown away. It was not surprising that Torment missed it. He hadn't clued in on the much larger incongruity that Robin-the-human had been fighting him while Torment was still a hundred feet off the ground.

"You always were poor at assessing essential qualities, Weames." Robin said, the Genocide member lunging out of the smoke, hacking and coughing.

Raven's skyscraper-sized blast of darkness hammered Torment into the ground so hard, Robin felt it in his back teeth. He prepared to leap down after the villain…

He never got the chance. Raven had provided the platform he'd stood on in the air, and it vanished as she screamed. His fall wasn't long, as Starfire was immediately there to grab him, but Robin almost didn't notice.

Gauntlet caught the falling Raven, as he was closer. He did not make a witty remark, as his attention was on the same thing as Robin's. The tower of black that had been used to strike down Torment was twisting and contorting into its impact site. Gauntlet glanced at Raven, who was holding her head, and then back at her power.

The last of it vanished into Torment as he stood up. He rolled his shoulders, a crackle of black sparks shooting from his body.

"Not really, Robin." Torment said. "I know what's important. Strength, and how to hold onto it. The first time you beat me by luck. The second time by lying to me. This time, you have neither fortune nor deception. Without it, you have little chance. With the power I have behind me?"

Torment clenched both fists, more black sparks flying from them.

"You have none."

The sonic cannon blast converged with the plasma one, Cyborg and Morgue (with a retrieved _Dyson's Fear)_ perfectly synchronizing their strikes. Torment vanished in the explosion. Morgue immediately took cover while Cyborg charged in, lancing into the smoke cloud before it could clear. The sound of crashing metal briefly preceded Torment and Cyborg's battling forms as they tumbled out of the smoke.

"Raven?" Savior said, dropping down near Gauntlet.

"I'm fine. Go help Cyborg. You too, Gauntlet. I'm not hurt." Raven said, standing up.

Savior still hesitated two seconds. Raven felt the faint stirrings of her love for him in that. He might have prided himself on being a great tactician and fully confident in her abilities, but he was still human.

"Do you want to hit him high or low, Gauntlet?" Savior asked.

"Why don't we both hit him high and just knock his block right off before this devolves into forty pages of noise and pulmonologist appointments?" Gauntlet said, as the two ran off.

"That's just crazy enough to work." Savior said, while reflecting that, even after all these years, he still had no idea what Gauntlet was talking about half the time.

"What happened Raven?" Robin said, arriving next to the sorceress. Raven did not immediately answer, instead using her powers to peer into Torment's framework.

"…bastard. The Lord's made a reliquary to absorb my power. Weames has it." Raven said, seeing the dark, twisted construct clear as day once she knew where to look.

"Can you remove it?"

"No, it's right on top of his heart. It'd kill him."

"Can we disable it?"

"…no."

"Can _you_?"

"I'd either need several hours of uninterrupted concentration or for Nelson, Blood, and Zatara to all simultaneously drop dead and will their powers into me."

Robin looked at Raven. She met his eyes.

She didn't even have to read his mind to know what he wanted her to do.

Darkness rose up and consumed Raven, and she vanished from sight. Robin turned and ran back into the battle.

Torment, meanwhile, was lunging into Cyborg's guard and burying his fist into his gut. Cyborg lacked an exhale reflex, but with Torment whirling around and nearly backhanding his jaw off, he didn't really notice.

"Now, I don't want to put too fine a point on it this early, but…you're all screwed." Torment said. Gauntlet and Savior's twin attack was not as effective as Morgue and Cyborg's, as this time Torment jumped out of the way. "Now, I could expound more on just WHY…but I think I'll let actions speak for me."

"You all right Cyborg?" Beast Boy said.

"Bastard stole my Ipod!"

"He what?"

"Or maybe sing." Torment said, as he held out the device. White energy surged into it.

"_NEVER GONNA GIVE YOU UP! NEVER GONNA LET YOU DOWN! NEVER GONNA COME AROUND-!" _The Ipod blared, even as it fired out sonic waves that pulverized everything in front of it. Terra, flying in on a rock, found her platform being shaken apart, forcing her to cut off and retreat.

"…Did Torment just try and kill us with a _RICK ROLL?"_ Terra said.

"Bastard! THAT SONG'S NOT EVEN ON MY PLAYLIST!"

"Hmmm." Torment said, tossing the music player over in his hand. The rock exploded nearby, and Savior leapt up…directly into the arcing kick Torment fired off into his face. Savior crashed backwards several meters before the Shimmer dug into the ground and stopped him, while Torment slowly finished the 360 degree clockwork arc his leg had made, setting it back down. "Come on now. You think I spent all the time you were beating up my fellows twiddling my thumbs?"

"Let's find out." Savior said, manifesting multiple Shimmer weapons and leaping back at the villain.

"ALWAYS THE CONDESCENDING ONE!" Torment said, a cloud of grey bursting off his arms and forming into twisting tendrils around him. When Savior lashed out, they immediately blocked the Shimmer, the synchronization almost perfect.

"Oh, what is _THIS?_" Savior said, yanking himself away and manifesting more Shimmer strands around his legs to move faster, even as he doubled the Shimmer weapons whirling around him. "Anything YOU-!"

The white energy clashed with the grey.

"Can do, I CAN DO BETTER?" Savior yelled, punctuating each word with a strike. Torment cocked his head, and his grey tendrils abruptly became covered with thorny barbs. Savior jerked back with a hiss.

"Seems like that, yeah." Torment said, and whirled about, lashing out with his leg. A slashing tornado of energy erupted from the kick, catching Savior and knocking him backwards into a rock mass. Gravity only held onto the Titan a second, as the grey tendril extending from Torment's hand seized him by the ankle and yanked Savior into a pistoning thrust kick. The grey mass surged out in turn from the blow, pinning Savior to Torment's foot as he spun his leg up and then stomped Savior into the ground.

"Then again, you were never as good as you thought you were. Mostly haughty. Shame, really." Torment said, transforming one arm back into the gatling cannon and aiming it down at the Titan. "Let me show you a more literal meaning of 'holier than thou'."

The darkness dagger erupted from the shadows, striking Torment directly in the neck. All he did was glance upward, the energy absorbing itself into its body, even as the dark mass that had fired the strike vanished once more.

"Sorry, Raven. I'm afraid it counts even if I'm not paying attention."

The Shimmer slammed into Torment's chin and throat as hard as it could. Torment's sole response was, again, just another glance.

"That doesn't count at all."

The cape buffalo slammed into Torment from his blind spot, the combination of two thousands pounds of muscle and a giant pair of horns succeeding where the Shimmer had failed. Savior rolled out of the way the moment Torment's foot was no longer planted on him, Beast Boy expertly stepping over his teammate as he continued to ram into Torment. When Torment started to push back, Beast Boy turned into a fly and buzzed away. The abrupt loss of momentum made Torment stumble, and Terra promptly hammered three rock pillars down onto his metal body. Two seconds after that, Starfire flew in and blew the rock towers to oblivion.

After two second's silence, Torment burst upward from the smoke.

"Th-"

Scalpel met the villain in mid-leap, his warhammer ringing across the sky as he slammed it into Torment. The Genocide member hit the ground, bounced one time, and then was hammered back into it by Gauntlet's leaping energy blow. Landing from his own jump, Scalpel leapt forward again, grabbing his teammate and pulling Gauntlet away from Torment. The car-sized Starbolt crashed down a second later, consuming a thirty foot radius in destructive green energy.

"I'm not expecting to win off that, but man, I hope that hurt. Would it be too much to ask for that to HURT?" Gauntlet asked.

"Not good…" Scalpel said.

"Nigel? You all right?"

"That strike with my hammer hit. Not like my first. Felt almost the same." Scalpel said, his bladed fingers clicking against his palm as he assessed the two impacts. "He's not dense. Lightweight metals, no matter how strong, would be showing deformation from the blows he's taken. I think he's negating the energies altogether. Kinetic, incendiary, ultrasonic in Cyborg's case…and he's outright absorbing Raven's power. That may or may not extend to the Fang shards, but they didn't seem to help much against Genocide."

"I call hacks! Wait, the Lord made him, right? What about solar power?"

"Starfire's energies are derived from that. I guess we're about to wait and see."

"But…even if he shrugs that off, he has to have a limit, right?"

"Oh, everything has a limit."

The sound of clapping came from the smoke cloud that rose from the crater, Torment emerging from it with only a few scuff marks to show for what he'd endured.

"Bravo. Bravo. That WAS you gauging the level of force you'd need to use on me, right? Because if you were actually TRYING, well, wouldn't want to be in your shoes."

"Plead the fifth." Gauntlet said. Torment's response was a hundred tiny red dots lighting up on his body.

"I'm beginning to have a real bad feeling about this one." Scalpel said.

Torment spun, and from his form came dozens upon dozens of shrieking, miniaturized missiles, the projectiles scattering everywhere in a perfect three-sixty degree radius.

"OH COME ON! CONSERVATION OF MASS! READ SOME DAMN PHYSICS TEXTS, YOU-!" Gauntlet yelled, and then his voice, like the ground and sky, was lost in the explosions.

* * *

Torment. The average mechanist would have tossed around terms like 'my greatest creation'. Marissa Mori did not. She had not recruited Nester Weames, nor had she planned on making a cybernetic superhuman. She was an engineer and roboticist, not a post-human crafter. The Lord had brought him to her, as well as the blueprints for what he wanted to do for her part in his creation. She had followed instructions, and nothing more. To her, watching Torment as he matched everything the Titans threw at him without any apparent effort, he was another example of her master's power and wisdom. The Abhorred could be compensated for. Genocide's first three members were untested and new to their powers. Her machines had been turned back and destroyed, which showed more than anything how much improvement they needed. Torment was the Lord's work, through and through.

Yet…

"_Mother?"_

_Marissa fumbled her instruments so hard she nearly impaled one of her work tools into her leg._

"…_oh. Sorry. I thought it would be a good ironic joke." Nester Weames said, his form reduced to a dull shimmer in the multi-colored liquid he was floating in. The Lord had implanted a device on his vocal cords that allowed her systems to relay anything he said, but this was the first time he'd actually used it. "I'm being reborn…for the third time, but the other two were inanimate objects, and you're the only one I ever see doing the work, so…mother?"_

"_...If that's what you prefer to call me." Marissa said._

"_Well, that's just what came to mind first. What else? Crafter? Tinker? Butcher, baker, candlestick maker, perhaps? That's not an excuse to stick three men in this tub, by the by. It's cramped enough."_

"…_whichever."_

"_Busy, then? This does seem…complicated. Can I get cable in here?"_

"…_no…"_

"_Eh, nothing on TV anyway." Nester said, and went quiet._

Though he did not stay that way.

"_So, when the Lord conquers the world, what are you going to do?"_

"…_I…I don't know." Marissa said, before she buried her head in the readings she was studying._

"_Me? I think I'll ask for Amsterdam. Whole city. Unchanged. Maybe even some kind of perception shield around it so people will actually want to come and party. Surely the Lord will allow a LITTLE bastion of less than admirable behavior, won't he? He talks about how absolutes always fail and you need to bring a proper balance to things, so…why not a place of minor sins?"_

_Marissa stared at the tube, having no clue how to answer._

"_What, did you want Amsterdam too? I'll flip you a coin for it. I can always have Cancun."_

"…_n-no…"_

"_Good! Because you forgot to put my wallet in here! I'm checking it when I get out, you know. I find anything missing, well, you know very well what you're building me into!"_

_Marissa just stared some more. Did he really not grasp what he was becoming?_

"_Actually, that reminds me. Will I be able to take this…suit, I guess, off? Because it doesn't have pockets. I need something to put my wallet in."_

"…_removal will be difficult but not impossible…but this is not a suit of powered armor. It's being bonded to your skin, muscles, and bones at a molecular level…taking it off would likely require some kind of specialized process…"_

"_Can you ask the Lord if he can make one of those processes then?"_

_Marissa goggled again. She could understand people asking for stuff from the master, but not so CASUALLY. Nester Weames was being recreated as something that could effectively dissect an extremely powerful and experienced superhuman team, and he was acting like he was ordering food at a restaurant. It baffled Marissa._

"…_he'll want something in return."_

"_Really? Wouldn't he be of the mindset that happy minions mean more effective minions? He doesn't strike me as the type who wants to rule through fear and abuse. That never gets good results. Don't you remember what happened with Hecatomb?"_

"…_What?"_

"_Did you miss that? I'll tell you then…" Nester said, and proceeded to ramble on for nearly twenty minutes about a supervillain group that had destroyed itself mainly through an abusive leader. Marissa didn't remember any of the details as much as she remembered the way the conversation went. Her sitting here, making a weapon…and the weapon acting like it was anything but._

And Nester Weames WAS a weapon now, in more ways then his ability to actually manifest them. It showed in everything from his stance when he stopped his missile-firing to how he defended himself when Starfire flew out of the smoke and tried to punch him. Despite floating in the air, he was able to step back like he was on solid ground, leaning backwards just a bit and causing Starfire to overshoot him, allowing him to bury a knee into her upper left torso. Starfire responded by spinning away and unleashing her eye beams at point blank range. Torment took the concentrated blast for three seconds before he blurred away and elbowed Starfire in the head from behind, sending her crashing to the ground.

A nearly perfect weapon. HER weapon…

No. The Lord's weapon.

No matter what anyone said…

No matter what HE said…

"…_you're very good at this, you know."_

_Marissa didn't almost-stab herself this time, but she did drop her equipment._

"_I knew going in this was going to be a long, hard process. It's been long, and not exactly FUN…but there's been little pain. Thanks to you."_

"…_I…you…you're welcome." Marissa said quietly, the words sounding strange in general, and even stranger to her. She couldn't remember the last time she'd gotten legitimate gratitude. The Lord sometimes complimented on her work, but always in a brief, quiet tone. He couldn't really show genuine gratitude: when he was happy, or the closest he could get to it, he tended more towards maniacal laughter and even more elaborate speeches. "You need to be careful, though. You're not completely invincible. You're very strong, more than strong enough to handle the Titans all at once…but you can't make deliberate mistakes, or think nothing they do can hurt you. You can win a war of attrition, but only if you approach it properly. Wasting energy to show off will only result in bad…results."_

"_Hey, trust me ma'am. I know the Titans. The only reason they beat me the last two times was luck. The first time, it was because my power device failed me out of nowhere. The second time, they managed to trick me into thinking my power was going to kill me. Until then, I had them on the run. THIS time, they don't have anything. I have all the cards. Hell, whatever other defenses you have, save 'em. Send me out first. I promise you won't be disappointed."_

"…_I'll bring it up to the Lord." Marissa said._

"_Okay. Now, what about getting a TV in here?"_

"…_Too many machines. It would scramble any reception you would get."_

"_Of all the luck."_

Gauntlet emerged from the smoke without any sound or indication he was coming, his ninja heritage in full bloom. It didn't help. Torment blurred away from his hammer-strike, and then blurred back to kick Gauntlet in the ribs back through the smoke cloud.

"What is this, DBZ?"

Beast Boy was next, emerging as some horrific THING that looked like a cross between a gorilla, a dinosaur, and a box of ginsu knives (an alien creature known as a _deemer_, deem being a slang term in the Vega system for 'death'). Torment dodged its clawing grasp. He did not dodge the following spin kick, a move that an actual deemer could have never done on purpose. Instead, he stopped the limb cold, before grabbing onto Beast Boy and yanking him off his feet, swinging the changeling over his head and into the ground before he spun around a few times and hurled Beast Boy into the distance.

Morgue's _Dyson's Fear_ blast struck him directly in the back. It almost knocked the villain down. Almost. When he regained his feet, the beam was STILL boring against him, He turned around and began walking, with some effort, directly against the blast. The last of the smoke cleared to reveal Morgue, set in a kneeling stance and trying her best to keep the weapon functioning…

"_How do you feel?"_

"_Lighter…lighter than I thought." Torment said, turning his hands around For the first time, they were face to face, Torment's armor a dull grey instead of the brilliant silver/platinum it would become, his hair wet and stringy instead of commercial-level gold. Their location was a tiny square mile of dead rock and sand somewhere in the Atlantic ocean, shifting grey clouds overhead._

"_The implantation and technological/sorcerous merge is about ninety-six percent complete…the Lord wants a test run on a few things. Basic…operating instructions are…here…" Marissa said, offering Nester a device similar to a flash drive. He took it and opened a panel on his arm, inserting it with a dull click._

"_How many pages of information are on here?"_

"_1300. Give or take."_

"_Well, let's see if I can speed read." Nester said, and closed his eyes._

_He stood like that for nearly twenty minutes, saying nothing, remaining stock still. Marissa studied his systems while he did so, gathering data and checking it against projections._

_Her readings spiked nearly off the scale a second before Torment planted both his feet and hunched down, clenching his fists._

"_What are you doing?"_

"_All that stuff…dynamic nullification this and energy cascade that, all that stuff about gravity and magnetism and matter implication and alteration…it makes your eyes start to glaze over, Marissa! Sometimes you just have to GET IN THE CAR AND DRIVE."_

_A faint orb of purple energy erupted from Nester's body, engulfing Marissa and making her body tingle. Her computers continued to yell at the immense scale Nester had decide to jump right to, and Marissa jerked her head around. The orb encompassed her and the equipment she had brought, but based on her readings…_

"_Marissa? I'd stay still." Nester said. The orb surged back into him, and crackling, snarling white energy surged and burned across his body. "This is going to be…"_

_Torment thrust out his arms. The sound of the explosion would have deafened Marissa if she hadn't activated the noise-dampeners in her ear-buds. The ground's violent shift was enough to nearly make her fall down, and the energy that washed over her, making her feel like she'd been slapped on every part of her body, did the rest. Choking smoke washed over her, and she took a moment to pop in a breathing filter before standing back up, her goggles protecting her eyes from the cloud. Turning off the sound-blocking allowed the loud rushing noise to reach Marissa's ears._

"_Ha…ha. Big." Torment said, lowering his arms. Only the fact that he still had the vocal cord modifications let Marissa hear him. The source of the rushing noise came clear when the smoke did as well. The island had been reduced to the twenty square feet she and Nester were currently standing on. Torment had vaporized the rest, and the sea was rushing in to fill the void._

"_Now THAT'S on the job training." Torment said, his mouth curling up into a wicked smirk."…you all right, Marissa? I made sure you'd be in the safe zone. Big booms are good, but fine control's better, wouldn't you say?"_

"…_yes." Marissa said, turning around and looking at how much smaller the island had gotten, even as she tried to mentally calculate how much energy that would have required so she could match it up to Nester's current readings._

_Nester's hand abruptly clapped on her shoulder. For a moment blind panic FLOODED Marissa, and she nearly turned around and fired her personal sidearm into his face. Before she could, though, Torment moved up to her side. He wasn't attacking her. He was giving her a gesture of commendation._

"_And now you steal away, take him out today. Nice work you did…you're gonna go far kid." Nester said, looking out at the destruction he'd wrought. "Wouldn't you say?"_

"_Well…you did better than expected."_

"_Why not? I have you." Nester said. "…what, you didn't recognize the song? Offspring? Do you do ANYTHING except fiddle with machines?"_

"…_uh…"_

"_Oh no matter. Plenty of time to expand your horizons when the world is ours."_

"_**You mean mine."**_

_The Lord bloomed up from the ground, forming into his usual shadowy mass._

"_**My world. Delivered by my esteemed creations." **__The Lord said. __**"We'll go far, indeed."**_

Despite herself, Marissa smiled, just a bit. The Titans hadn't even seen one of Torment's greatest tricks. But they soon would.

* * *

Morgue was smart enough to stop firing the weapon before it broke down. She was also smart enough to realize that the fact she had been holding fire on her enemy for over ten seconds and all he'd done was notice her for it made any more attacking as she currently was likely to be counterproductive, and snapped off the plasma ray before she turned to run. She would have needed little more than a second to become her bat swarm. Torment didn't give it to her, blurring over, seizing the Titan by the neck, and driving her into the ground. Marissa, still viewing it on her screen array, winced at the sight.

"Don't recall you." Torment said.

"Okay…new plan. Don't get caught." Morgue said, and tried to scatter into bats once more. Torment quickly put an end to that plan via a massive jolt of electricity, one that stunned the mortician despite her advanced armor and shield.

"Apparently, you aren't very good at priority assessment." Torment said, before he turned his gaze on the nearby _Dyson's Fear. _"However, you brought me a new toy. So I'll forgive you."

"Super strong, near-invulnerable, with lots of powers…anything I missed?"

"What?…Oh. Assessment. Ha. Cute." Torment said. "Just for that, I'll let you go."

Amazingly, Torment did. Even as he laid his hand on _Dyson's Fear._

Morgue tossed the sticky bomb onto the villain's shoulder and dove for her weapon, grabbing it up and rolling behind some cover as the explosive went off. She took a moment to check the weapon's battery, and then re-emerged.

Torment stood where she'd left him, one hand trailing away from his head. The explosive hadn't seemed to do much more than annoy him.

"Really? Really? I try and be nice, and you go straight for a killing move? That's not very heroic of you, Titan."

"Try again, I'm pretty sure some of my bones didn't snap." Morgue said, aiming her cannon.

"…nah." Torment said, and with a rapid wave of his hand, another explosion blasted at Morgue's feet, sending her flying backwards.

"Yeah, sure, great…why do I feel you'd notice it more if I was a civilian with a shoe…" Morgue got out before she landed, trying to remember how to direct a tumble and other things, like which way was up.

"I'd rather…"

Cyborg's sonic cannon beam, unlike Morgue's, didn't even strike Torment, the villain snapping out his hand and splitting the blast like it was paper. Keeping one arm out to protect himself, Torment held the other arm up, red and gold energies shooting into the ground.  
Terra, moving in to strike in turn, paused as the rock began to float up.

"Oh that son of a bitch. Is he stealing my powers too?"

"Either that, or he suddenly developed an urge for a Lego substitute." Gauntlet said. Cyborg had cut off his blast while they were talking, and with a roar of jets, he flew over to the pair.

"Neither! Get to cover!"

"Why?" Gauntlet said, while the last pieces of rock joined the mass floating near the Genocide member.

A brilliant flash blinded the Titans for a second, and then a copy of _Dyson's Fear _dropped into his grip.

"…OH COME ON! ALCHEMY IS A FRAUD! HE DIDN'T EVEN MAKE A CIRCLE!" Gauntlet yelled.

"No, he just floated up a mass of rock corrupted with the power of the bastard he sold his soul to." Terra said.

"THAT'S NOT AN ACCEPTABLE REASON!"

"Hey, alchemy's possible. It's just it doesn't deal with fire, water, earth, and air, but protons, neutrons, and electrons." Cyborg said.

"…The stress got to me. I forgot science works the way we say it works to do whatever we want." Gauntlet said.

"You're talking to the man whose father was able to completely recreate his body perfectly with cybernetics while standing by the girl whose unique electrical brain signals let her pick up mountains with her mind."

"Exactly my point."

"How very machine-like of you, Cyborg." Torment said, turning and aiming at the trio. "Human speed limits, though."

"Speak for yourself." Cyborg said, and the Titans split apart, trying to draw Torment's fire to one target and leaving him open for an attack.

"I do." Torment said, and the massive cannon suddenly sprouting four new guns around its giant barrel, green energy shots erupting from it and flying across the sky.

"BULLLLLSHHHIIIITTTTTT-!" Gauntlet yelled, his dodging turning into blocking. He was about to say something else, but whatever it was was lost to the ages when Torment fired into his mass of green energy shots with a blue blast from the main gun, consuming the sky with a fiery explosion.

"Yo dawg, I hear you like to gun it, so we put a gun in your gun so you can gun while you gun." Torment said.

"That was also terrible-!" Gauntlet called weakly from somewhere.

Black and white struck as one, Savior's Shimmer mixing with Raven's power as he struck Torment from the side. Encased in the same ebony armor Raven had earlier used with Beast Boy, Savior dug into Torment's armor and tried to tear into something vital. Torment's own grey strands were quicker, lashing out and seizing the Titan before dragging him into the villain's giant gun, Torment slashing the weapon in an upward arc as he used it as a bludgeon. The black shield on Noel shattered on impact, the pieces flying to Torment and being absorbed into him. With a laugh, Torment aimed the gun upward and unleashed its firepower; only the fact that the villain shot immediately and hence could not put much energy in the blast saved Noel from a considerably harsher fate. It was still enough to first blow him into the sky and then out of it, the Titan crashing down in a smoking heap nearly a hundred feet away.

"Sorry Raven. Even directed through someone else, it's still the same."

Starbolts crashed down around Torment, and he turned back to the sky and began to fire in turn. Starfire dodged the explosive blasts and flew in low, slashing through the air around Torment and occasionally throwing another Starbolt. Torment kept up remarkably well…

Too well. Robin leapt in from his blind spot, red sword stabbing for Torment's gun arm. Torment, if he saw Robin, did not manage to dodge in time.

The weapon did not stop dead against the villain's arm, but its momentum was cut off so harshly Robin almost lost his grip on the weapon, the Titan barely able to disengage his grip properly. His gloves were armored, but his blade was also very sharp. Not sharp enough to cut through Torment's armor, though. The tip had only made it two inches in, as the Genocide member turned and smiled at the Titan leader.

Scalpel's hand made a ringing noise as he leapt in turn and smashed his palm against the sword's hilt, driving it fully through Torment's arm. For the first time, Torment yelled in pain, losing his grip on the _Dyson's Fear _copy. He did not get a chance to retaliate, as Starfire surged in, her whole body glowing. The supercharged blast struck both the gun and Torment's left knee, the explosion even managing to throw Scalpel off-balance as he leapt away. Robin rode it out better, having ducked down just before impact.

Starfire immediately flew back out of range, drained from her shot. Robin stood back up, producing his staff and turning on the infrared and motion trackers within his mask. They showed the figure rising from the smoke. When it swung out its arm, Robin dodged out of the way.

Torment had merely blown away the smoke. His gun was ruined, but his knee only seemed scorched. With a calm gesture, he reached up and yanked Robin's crimson blade out of his arm, wincing as he did so. If he had any blood, it did not emerge from his wound. A low wrenching creak reached Robin's ears as Torment bent, and then snapped, his sword into two pieces with his fingers alone. A blaze of golden energy finished the job, Torment dropping the burnt remains by his side.

"Is it true what they say?" Torment said. "Are you the son of the Bat?"

Robin just remained where he stood.

"Would the Bat throw his own flesh and blood into a meat grinder like this? Is he that confident? Are you that foolish?"

"Your master hurt my friends. He wants to destroy the world. The rest doesn't matter." Robin said, withdrawing two Birdarangs and interlocking them together to form a new sword.

"Confident, aren't we?"

"Got the track record for it."

"Maybe-"

Starfire's punch flew into Torment's grasping hand, the Genocide member not even looking in her direction as he caught her fist. Blazing red energy exploded from his clenched hand, both blasting Starfire backwards and throwing Torment towards Robin. Robin dodged out of the way…

Torment blurred behind him. Robin lashed out with a kick, expecting the move. He might as well have kicked the dormant volcano on _La Voix _for all the good it did, Torment blocking it with his forearm. Robin sliced his second blade at Torment's left shoulder. Torment slapped the sword away with his other hand so hard that Robin lost his grip on the weapon. Robin moved to protect his ankle…only for Torment's hand to go grabbing at Robin's _belt _instead, his blurring fingers seizing onto it before the Titan leader could get away.

Robin ran through his options at rapid-speed. Snapping off his belt was a last resort move. Punching Torment was likely useless. He didn't have time to reach his staff. Sticking another bomb on his head would either be useless or excessive. In the end, Robin tossed the dice and violently dug his thumb into Torment's right eye as his response, trying to both blind him and cause him some pain.

Instead, it felt like he was jamming a fork into an electrical socket, even WITH his armor. Backed into a corner, Robin hit the emergency switch on his belt with his other arm, pulling away before the shock completely paralyzed him. Robin expected Torment to destroy the belt.

"Now _I _have all your wonderful toys." Torment said, red and gold energies arching down the length of the belt and back into Torment's arm. Tossing the utility belt aside, Torment snapped up a hand, a black and grey birdarang emerging directly from his palm. "Wanna play?"

Torment tossed the corrupted Birdarang at Robin.

Robin grabbed it in mid-air and threw it right back. With a laugh, Torment knocked it aside.

"You ARE good!" Torment said, raising his hands. More Birdarangs appeared, and then replicas of Robin's explosive discs, the two merging together into bladed bombs. "Try and catch _these_."

Robin dodged out of the way instead, the explosions sending burning shrapnel slamming into his body. His shields and training allowed him to keep his feet, while Cyborg finally intervened again to slash at Torment with his solar blades. Torment re-manifested his grey tendrils and slashed right back at Cyborg, the two tearing up the ground beneath them as Robin went for his discarded belt.

His heart sank as he felt its weight. Light. Torment had done one better than replicating his weapons. He'd absorbed them, gaining them for himself and stealing them from Robin in one fell swoop. He hadn't touched Robin's detective equipment or basic tools, but Robin doubted that a fingerprint scanner or a blowtorch would be much help now.

Robin snapped the belt back on anyway. Time to adapt.

Fast, as Torment got into Cyborg's guard and leveled him with an uppercut. Energy arched on his body before exploding in a shining crimson pillar all around him, the blast carrying Cyborg upwards and out. In a scary bit of endurance and grace, Cyborg righted himself from the attack and countered with his own sonic blast as he fell. Torment knocked it aside, allowing Starfire to hammer him upside the head from his blind side, sending him tumbling away.

"Victor?" Robin said, dashing over.

"I'm all right." Cyborg said, having landed on his feet. "More or less. What'd he do?"

"Absorbed my weapons. Don't have much left."

"High degree osmosis too? Friggin Pandora's box here." Cyborg said. "All right, I'll modify the wavelengths of my circuits. If he wants to take MY stuff, he's gonna have to stand still and work at it for a bit." Cyborg said. "He's damn tough, Robin."

"I know." Robin said, as Torment traded blasts with Starfire. When she got blown up again, Robin merely flinched, even less so than Cyborg. The Titan glanced at his leader after the fact; he'd never been able to tell if he found Robin's ability to let ice water run in his veins during important situations admirable or unnerving.

"Orders?"

"…stay the course." Robin said, and slapped Cyborg on the shoulder, his fingers clenching on his friend's metal body for half a second before he broke away, ducking down and disappearing behind some residual smoke.

"Roger that." Cyborg said, and promptly did some osmosis of his own, his right arm splitting apart and reforming into a gatling gun that he unleashed on Torment. Bullets did not prove to be the magic…bullet for the villain, even in such excessive amounts, though after a few seconds of being shot, Torment did turn back around and manifest a shield that the projectiles began ricocheting off.

"Trying to serve as another distraction?"

"Something like that." Cyborg said, and then his gatling arm flew off his body and rocketed towards Torment. The gun _did _stop firing while he did this; Torment was still surprised enough to dodge.

The black beam slammed into his body, Terra holding up the huge diamond she had produced as a focus while Raven fired into it. Torment…took two steps back, and then smirked, the beam arcing off his chest and into his hand, once again absorbing the power.

"Distraction, imbuement, focus…all of it, Raven. No damn good." Torment said.

The black portal appeared at Torment's feet, and Starfire surged up through her, her shining fist slamming under Torment's chin. Unlike Torment's earlier pillar-blast, which was based on momentum, the Starbolt explosion was more of a wracking kind, briefly stunning the Genocide member long enough for Starfire to spin and bring her OTHER arm up into his face, the second explosion merging with the first and throwing Torment through yet another rock mass.

"He's got your number, it seems." Terra said, looking at the shadowed form beside her. Raven may or may not have responded with a nod, all details of her form lost to the darkness, the sorceress vanishing back down into the ground just before Gauntlet came running up to join the two.

"Still absorbing her power?"

"Yep."

"I'm not sure what we're supposed to do about this."

"How about we hit him until he doesn't get back up?" Terra asked. As if on cue, Torment rose from the dust of his last landing site. "Oh look, we still get our crack at that!"

"I thought that's what we were already doing."

"Well then, let's do it HARDER!"

"You're the boss." Gauntlet said, forming a hammer.

Scalpel beat Gauntlet to the punch, charging in and swinging his warhammer. Torment blurred aside and kicked the alien away. Savior leapt in from above right afterwards, trying to confuse Torment's gray-tendril defenses with Shimmer lines before using said lines to pull himself down towards his opponent for a kick. Torment stopped the attack before it began by simply blasting Savior out of the sky. Beast Boy lunged in next, steam snorting from his nostrils, his green equine body equally sheened with sweat. Torment, in return, looked mildly interested as the horse charged at him.

"I know you can't spawn metal on your feet, and that's assuming I even let your hindquarters turn towards m-"

Beast Boy promptly chomped down on Torment's shoulder, dense teeth digging into the metallic armor. Torment was more surprised than hurt.

"The fuck?"

The nail of dense stone planted itself on Torment's back before Gauntlet brought his hammer down. Beast Boy tumbled away, turning back to normal while holding his jaw.

"What kind of horse was that again?" Gauntlet said, Morgue appearing by his side.

"If I had to hazard a guess? Mare of Dionysus. Man-eaters. Hercules had to tame them for one of his labors." Morgue said, and took repeated shots at Torment with her hand-cannon.

"Huh. Guess I need to read more."

"Did you read our tactical guides?" Cyborg said as he appeared in turn behind both of them.

"Skimmed 'em. I think I got the gist of it. HP greater than zero plus us equals win."

"If those are the terms you're gonna use…dot dot dot." Cyborg said.

"I read you." Gauntlet said, forming two yellow energy swords…and a third in his mouth.

"…what are you doing?" Morgue said.

"It's called an homage. Clearly I'm not the only one who needs to read more." Gauntlet said.

"Save it Gauntlet!" Cyborg yelled, jetting in front of the pair and manifesting his solar blades, crossing them in an X before him that Torment slammed his hand down on the energy blades. A laser-like blast lanced from Torment's fingers as a follow up, but Cyborg just snapped his head to the side, losing a small piece of his ear in the process. Morgue and Gauntlet spun around Cyborg and unleashed two quick shots and slashes into Torment's exposed flanks before they retreated, Cyborg jetting away himself to dodge Torment extending his firing spire-arches from his back and blowing up the ground around him. Retracting them, Torment turned around and manifested his gray tendrils instead, Savior leaping in to duel him again.

"You know, sooner or later, you're going to learn my powers are superior." Torment said, and barbs sprang up from his tendrils (once more), causing Savior to recoil in pain (once more, to his immense distaste).

"And I'm going to _teach _you how to…get glass shards…repeatedly…jammed into your…thick bastard skull!" Savior hissed.

"Neat. It'll be like a trade." Torment said, and blasted at Savior, Starfire pulling him out of the way.

"Carcinobutt already SAID THAT, YOU THIEF!" Beast Boy said, charging in as a lion.

"One, I daresay thief's an insult here." Torment said, and opened up his arm to fire more micro-missiles at Beast Boy. The cat dodged around the blasts, lunging and then turning into a ferret again, running past Torment as he fired over where he'd expected Beast Boy to be. "Two…it was a good line?"

Starfire blasted Torment in the side with her laser eyes. Torment shot more micro-missiles that homed in on her and turned to look for whatever ambush was coming. Scalpel defied expectations by charging directly at him. Torment blasted him in the knees, knocking him down, which revealed Gauntlet had been running directly behind him and using the alien's profile for cover. Still wielding his three swords, the blonde-haired Titan leapt and slashed…and abruptly dodged while Morgue blasted Torment from the side with _Dyson's Fear_. Torment blurred away immediately after the impact of the shot, and Gauntlet landed in a flipping roll and bounded onto his feet…

Which caused his third blade to catch on the edge of an inconvenient rock protrusion and yank painfully at his mouth.

"OW! This is, in retrospect, highly impractical!" Gauntlet muttered through his mouth-sword.

"I read you." Morgue commented, firing at Torment once again while Cyborg did likewise and Terra pelted him with rocks.

"Hah…good work Titans. Good work!" Torment said, his tone even despite the hostile efforts that were knocking him around. Red and gold power arced into the ground, yanking two more pieces of rock up and morphing them into two smaller Dyson's Fear clones. "IF YOU CAN'T DO _BETTER_, YOU ARE _DONE _LIKE _DINNER_!"

The guns opened fire, not with energy blasts, but with Birdarangs and Robin's disc weapons, the air filling with slashing, exploding, and freezing projectiles, Torment literally turning the ground beneath his feet into his ammo as he spun around and wrecked havoc.

"I call hacks!" Gauntlet yelled.

"You already did that!" Scalpel yelled back as he leapt past.

"It doesn't make it WRONG!" Gauntlet said, throwing up a shield before an explosive disc detonated on him.

"Now dance, fucker, dance, man he never had a chance, and no one even knew, it was really only you…" Torment said, and extended his metallic spines to add even more carnage to the mix. "With a thousand lies and a good disguise, hit 'em _right _between the eyes, hit 'em _right _between the eyes. When you walk away, nothing more to say, see the lightning in your eyes, see 'em running _for their lives_."

* * *

The smoke and explosions didn't do much to hinder Marissa's observations; she simply switched from basic picture to tracking motion, body heat (as opposed to the far more intense heat explosions caused), adding sonar on top of it. It was the last one that made her realize the issue.

For nearly twenty seconds, she stared at the screen, her mouth slowly going dry. She had two options and both had potentially terrifying consequences. She began to shake, almost curling up in a fetal position for a second, before she gathered what little resolve she had and made her choice.

The firing mechanism she had used to unleash the tower blast at the Titans as they fought Genocide was still there. Marissa put her hand on it and concentrated.

"Sir? Sir, can you hear me? We have an issue."

Silence. Marissa waited. Seconds ticked by, as her throat went as dry as her mouth.

"…_**What is it, Miss Mori?"**_

Deep beneath Marissa's feet, in an expansive room filled with twisting strands of incomprehensible words and symbols, the glowing threads emitting the only light in the chamber, the Lord stood before a deep ugliness. The sight before him was like if someone had transmogrified the air before him to skin and then subjected it to acid and a blowtorch, a sign of great abuse and unnatural violence. The same mystical chirography that illuminated this horror had, by now, covered nearly every part of the Lord's body, the darkness demi-god standing with one hand raised, a book floating above it as the pages slowly turned. His other hand was pressed against his head. He really shouldn't be doing this, he needed all his concentration for this…but if Marissa was contacting him, with how meek and terrified she was of displeasing him, it had to be important.

"Robin's gone."

"_**He got caught in an attack and there doesn't appear to be a body?"**_

"No, he just…left. I lost track of him in the fight and I've come to the realization that he's abandoned the battleground entirely."

"…_**he's coming here." **_The Lord said. _**"Why would he be breaking away from his team to come here…"**_

"Torment absorbed most of his weapons, sir."

"…_**what is he planning…is he attempting to suss out a weakness to strike at it…no matter…" **_The Lord said. Marissa felt her heart sink. She knew what was coming next. _**"Miss Mori, I cannot defend you. And Drake is too smart to go directly for me. That means he'll likely try sabotage, and the only thing he can really sabotage has you sitting right in front of it. You know what that means."**_

"Yes sir."

"_**Activate it. Even if he never comes near you, you can never be…too careful…" **_The Lord trailed off.

"Sir?"

"…_**This makes no sense. Not for someone of Drake's caliber." **_The Lord said. _**"A traditional leader might try and pull this kind of feint, but Drake's a genius who's studied me. He knows very well he has no chance against me in combat. Either he has a weapon I don't kno-"**_

The Lord's voice abruptly dissolved in a pained roar, causing Marissa to jerk away from the firing platform. A second later, it shattered into pieces, Marissa staring at it with wide horrified eyes.  
"…sir?" Marissa said. She knew she wasn't going to get an answer. Something had happened. She'd failed, made an oversight, and she was alone.

All alone.

* * *

The sun.

Someone had brought the goddamn SUN into the omphalos of HIS tower, HIS world, its burning rays washing over him and breaking his link with Marissa. In that moment of pain, the _Zelmotta Arcana _was torn from his grip, flying to Raven's hands.

Outside, her shade vanished, breaking apart into nothing. Marissa had spotted the absence of the wholly mortal Robin, but Raven was, in some ways, considerably better at hiding things. Savior, who was nearby, spotted the copy's disintegration. She had not told him her plan, but he'd suspected.

"Give him hell, Raven." Savior said, and returned to the Torment battle. Inside Etemenanki, Raven gave the Lord's grimoire hell first, the ancient book bursting into flames as the Lord turned around, smoke rising from his body. In a flash, all the arcane script around the room vanished, plunging it into complete darkness.

"…That book was a gift." The Lord said.

Raven lit up the whole room again with a black blast shot through with golden energy. It slammed into the Lord, and the wounded air behind him vanished into the ether. The wall behind the Lord was not as considerate, Raven hammering him through it before he was smashed into the ground.

The fresh pain lit the fires of dark rage within the Lord. Robin wasn't assaulting his tower. Not alone. He'd sent Raven in first and hidden the fact, even from him. And Raven…

She'd found a way to intermingle her powers with solar energies. The Lord would have admired the spell craftsmanship if it didn't hurt so damn much.

He'd adapt, though. He always did. Adapt, and avenge.

Starting now, as Raven followed through the hole she'd made with his body. The Lord snapped out his hand, said a few words in a language that would make normal people's ears bleed, and fired his own black blast. Raven blurred to the side, the attack vanishing into the room behind her. With a gesture, she reconstructed the wall and covered it with black power. Nothing was coming around to hit her in the back.

Her eyes were as dark as the Lord's, though considerably calmer.

"…so then…the scorned female had come to unleash a fury unto hell, and stop the 'devil' who would dare make the world a better place." The Lord said. With his spell casting completely disrupted, his voice had lost the deeper cadence and echo it had taken on, though its menace had not lessened in the change.

"Shut up." Raven said, and fired a second dark blast. The Lord met this one, the two crashing their unique midnight energies against each other.

"Of course, that's how it works, isn't it? Kill me, all things are better! Except you KNOW they won't be!"

"Whatever challenges we face after this day, they will be ones free of your interference."

"And how much did I _have _to interfere?" The Lord said, and redoubled his efforts. The warring blast pushed back towards Raven…until the sorceress broke the conflict, blurred to the side once more, and fired off another mass of gold-tinted black energy. The infused ethereal power seized the Lord's own before it could strike the wall behind Raven, the Titan whirling and throwing it back at the Lord. He blocked it with the palm of his hand, but when the explosion cleared, it was evident that doing so had cost him.

"You are a liar, a bastard, and you will not leave this battle alive. That is all that matters. NOW DIE." Raven said, her voice as cold as the storms that constantly roared above Ginnungagap as she floated up. A mass of clawing hands came from the ground, reaching for the Lord. He dodged it by flying up, dispersing the hands with a blast of his own.

"So that's your truth, is it?" The Lord said. "All truth is simple…is that not doubly a lie?"

Raven responded with more blasting. The Lord blurred away, reaching another wall in the room and running along it. His dark cloaks began to solidify around him, forming proper armor that had faded as he got deep into his ritual, and Raven ducked as he lashed out his hand and clawed a car-sized chunk out of the wall behind her. The Lord leapt at her immediately afterwards, and Raven vanished into a portal. The Lord came to a stop where she had been, his dark eyes glimmering.

"Anyone who has declared someone else to be an idiot, a bad apple, is annoyed when it turns out in the end that he isn't."

Raven lanced from the shadows behind the Lord. He turned, his hand crackling with primal, black energies.

Their blows met each other, and Etemenanki shook with their combined rages, energies arcing off their hands and tearing up the floor and walls around them.

"That was great work you did, the alembic you placed in Torment. Absorbed my power completely. So completely I figured you'd sacrificed any ability you yourself could do it. Nice misdirection. It didn't work." Raven said. "In fact, with all the strength Torment's shown…I think you may have overdone it in other ways, Lord. I guess you haven't yet learned the folly of putting all your eggs in one basket."

"We'll see who the cock crows for." The Lord replied.

"_You _would seek the dawn?"

"Dawn means many things, Titan…but if you insist the terminology isn't suitable for me…we'll see for who the bell tolls for."

The Lord broke their grapple and thrust his other arm for Raven's torso. Her own hands blurred to stop him.

For the first time…too slow.

"_**IT TOLLS FOR THEE."**_

The room was consumed in dark fire. In the bowels of Etemenanki, tortured souls howled along.

They might soon have fresh company.

* * *

**AUTHOR NOTE: Hey, SLOTHSOUL and TERRAINE here. Funny story:**

**We hijacked the fic.**

**No, really. A lot of things have been changed-read back to CHAPTER 1 and a tiny portion of CHAPTER 4, see if you can spot the changes. It'll be a game!**

**Or just read them 'cause we want you to. Do it now.**

**...Or we'll do TERRIBLE THINGS to this cockney orphan.**

"...What? I'm not cockney. Not really an orphan either." Ryce blinks.

**Stop sticking to that story. It's not working.**

**READ!**

**(Thanks for the plug, LM)**


	6. Carry On My Wayward Son

Chapter 6: Carry On My Wayward Son

_Then out spake brave Horatius, _

_The Captain of the Gate: _

_"To every man upon this earth _

_Death cometh soon or late. _

_And how can man die better _

_Than facing fearful odds, _

_For the ashes of his fathers, _

_And the temples of his Gods" _

-**Thomas Babington Macaulay**, _Horatius_

* * *

_**Pain is vital, your first defense against the world…until it steals your mind.**_

_**Water is vital, the font of all life…until it steals your air.**_

_**Limits are vital, the means of keeping your body functioning…until it steals your ability to move.**_

…_**Idiocy is vital too. Not in one's self. But in others. Not recognizing the truth…refusing to peer into the shadows…letting you define the dark. Make the dark your own.**_

_**Letting you…in your own way…see the light.**_

_Even if the Lord had been able to locate a place that was open, he wouldn't have gone into it. Then again, the odds of him locating an accessible business at this hour and where he'd pulled himself ashore were about as high as him spontaneously sprouting wings and flying. All of Jump's old slums and ghettos might have been destroyed by Torment, but new ones had swiftly sprung up to replace them, the weeds of urban decay ever present against the gardens and flowers of any major city. _

_The official name for the zone was Cinder & Pike, named for the two streets that book-ended the bad regions, but to most, it was The Barbs, though the reason given for the nickname varied. Some said it was a slang term for the primary drug sold there, that being cocaine and its cheaper modifications, some said it was an ironic hardening of the shorthand terms 'The Burbs', and some said it was because the whole area should have been fenced off with barbed wire. The Teen Titans were, at the time, too young and inexperienced to try and tackle deeply-rooted problems like The Barbs, and hence had done little save beat up a few muggers and other low-level scum from and in the neighborhood. The neighborhood had plenty of **those **to spare, and worse._

_The Lord now counted among those worse, as he dragged his soaked, agonizing body through the streets of the Barbs, the neighborhood right up against the docks that the honest citizens of the neighborhood mostly worked in. Any business in the Barbs with any sense was long closed at this hour, not to mention locked up as tight as a drum, and the Lord lacked the strength to break in anywhere. But he had to rest. His senses were fading in and out, all the streets blurring together, every streetlight broken and the moon having fallen behind dark clouds. He couldn't sense anyone else, but he also couldn't tell if that meant no one else was there or that anyone who WAS was avoiding him for…whatever reason. If people were there, and he passed out on the street, he suspected they'd **stop **avoiding him. With the buildings all locked down, the Lord was forced to continue onward, trying to ignore his computer's constant insistence that he was risking various debilitating ailments if he continued._

_The faint concern in the back of his head that the residential areas might be locked up as tight as the businesses faded when he came across the church. It straddled the line between being simple and opulent, being fairly large but made of basic materials, its parking lot able to hold twenty cars at most. The spire gave away the building's status, as it lacked stained glass windows or more traditional church trappings like an atrium. Peering at the door, the Lord figured that if any place would be easier to break into, this would be it._

_Climbing the stairs felt like he was climbing a mountain, and the double doors were, of course, locked. The Lord almost punched the handle out of the doors before he gathered himself, two of his mechanical fingers splitting open and forming a lock pick. It did not take him long to gain access; any church that operated in an area like this either had far better security, nothing worth stealing, or nothing worth stealing for long. Pulling the door open, the Lord slipped inside, trying to get his mechanical eye to go to night vision. Closing his other eye wouldn't be hard, it was almost swollen shut already._

_Night vision, as it turned out, was not really needed. While the lights were off, the vestibule and nave were dimly lit by a few candles, providing enough illumination to make out the basic interior. The Lord dragged himself down towards the alter, planning to see if it had any cloth or basic material to use as bandages…_

_Until his exhaustion peaked. He'd stopped his wounds from bleeding…bandages could wait a few minutes. The Lord shifted into the front pew and sat there, coughing and spitting blood onto the ground. He glanced up at the vague shape of the cross on the alter. Catholic church, it seemed._

"_Sorry…I can't turn it into wine." The Lord muttered darkly._

"…_hello?" The other voice said. The Lord almost jumped to his feet on instinct, his control just managing to outrace it. The voice was too young to be a priest, and the Lord doubted anyone who would have followed him in, or followed him at all, would have announced themselves. Turning his head in the direction of the voice, the Lord vaguely saw a human-shaped blob of shadows at the far end of the other row of aisles._

"…_Hello." The Lord said, popping one claw. Part of him hoped he didn't have to use it. He had no time or energy to assess worth, and if he had to kill someone to keep them quiet without doing so, it was going to bother him for days._

"…_how did you get in here?" The voice said. The Lord noticed the softness in it. Perhaps no violence would be necessary. Voices like that tended to scare easy and scar deep._

"_Through the door."_

"_The door's locked."_

"_How did YOU get in here?" The Lord said, before coughing more blood onto the ground._

"…_through a window."_

"_That seems a little more unusual than a door, wouldn't you say?" The Lord said. Strange…he was never this chatty. Must be the blood loss._

"…_I felt like coming here."_

_The Lord didn't answer. Instead he looked at the teenager and peered beneath the shadows of his body into the shadows of his mind. He didn't have to go deep. Trauma like the boy's was depressingly common and easy to ferret out._

_The same old story. A father with no prospects and no courage to take his anger out on factors that would improve that, instead picking on helpless victims. Worse, a mother who just didn't seem to care. The end result: Pain, fear, living in hell until you either broke or became a breaker. If you had to sum up the absolute failure of the human race, a complete breakdown of the parental unit in this stripe would serve well._

"_You should just cut his damn throat when he sleeps."_

"…_what?"_

"_You heard me. Sitting in here won't help you. It hasn't helped anyone in this city and it won't start with you." The Lord said, looking back at the cross. "God helps those who help themselves."_

"…_who are you?" The voice said, now sounding terrified._

"_An angel." The Lord replied, and then had to forcibly stop himself from laughing. The pain wouldn't be worth it._

"…_really?"_

"_You decide." The Lord said, wiping blood from his lips. "What's it matter, in the end?"_

"…_I can't kill him…that's murder."_

"_Then he'll kill you. Or your mom. Or both. That's what his breed does, kid. It takes, and it takes, and when it can't take it more it dies. The highest grade parasite walking this planet."_

"…_but the Bible says…"_

"_What? Thou shall not kill? Soldiers kill. Police kill. Men and women sanctioned by governments kill. It's context, kid. An eons-old book filled with repurposed myths is a poor place to get morality." Yes, the blood loss was definitely affecting him. He'd degenerated into acting like he was arguing in a bar rather than sitting half-dead in a church he'd broken into talking with a stranger who could go running and screaming any second unless the Lord stopped him._

"_But you're in a church…"_

"_My problems aren't being solved by it. Neither are yours." The Lord said. "Really, child…have you ever really CONSIDERED the concept of God? Something that made everything, comprehends everything, is supposed to be kind and loving and yet made and allows so many bad things to happen? Forget the argument of whether He exists, or whether He loves or hates us. Do you really think you could comprehend the mindset, the planning, the MORALITY of such a being? Do you realize how ALIEN such a vast consciousness likely is? How deep a gulf between what we consider kindness and mercy and sin to be, and what he does? They say good people go to heaven and bad people go to hell, but how do you really know who is who by the concept of an omnipotent being? Really…God-fearing or God-cursing…is there much of a difference to something like that? Can YOU tell the subtle differences when a fly buzzes in your ear?"_

"…_But…if he's God, he WOULD know."_

"…_all right then. Let's say he knows. Let's say this world, and all its darkness, is some sort of test. A forging process to promote moral growth, the end result is to earn your way into heaven. Even if you claim suffering is an innate part of such a process, even IF there has to be a balance between 'good' and 'evil, EVEN IF our imperfect world is a part of that test and as a result it swings back and forth…let me simply ask you this, child. Name one bit of growth you've gotten from your father hitting you. Name ONE."_

_There was silence for a bit, and then a low sob. The Lord didn't even register it. The blood he'd lost had been replaced with fire._

"_EXACTLY! What kind of DEVELOPMENT is THAT? The statistics show it: anything but! You'll either grow up broken and sending out signals to the same breed of scum your father is that you're vulnerable, and you'll relive the whole cycle until you're dead or worse, or you'll give in to it! You'll be beaten into the mold of your abuser, eager to inflict pain, to project all your failings onto the flesh of others, a marvelous legacy of rot! WHAT KIND OF SYSTEM IS THAT? It doesn't promote moral growth! It goes in the exact OPPOSITE DIRECTION. It doesn't develop, it DECAYS! It undermines the very CONCEPT of the end result! Even if we consider an imperfect race must have an imperfect system, imperfect does not mean MEANINGLESS! And if we claim it's all arbitrary, well then, then you're just throwing dice at the wall and trying to get good results! That is NO WAY to run a system of morality, no matter HOW alien and sublime you might yourself be! It…it's not even evil, or cruel. That could be somewhat understandable, it's just…INEFFICIENT. God, whatever he is, as the centuries roll on, is a TERRIBLE manager. Whatever goals and agenda he might have, they're clearly so disconnected from the grunt level that they might as well not be there at all! No wonder they say we're made in his image. This is human failing WRIT LARGE. We deserve better than to sit in big buildings and waste oxygen making pleas to some kind of…bureaucrat."_

"…_who are you?" The voice said, between sniffles. The Lord found himself getting up, walking up to the alter, looking at the cross._

"_And they claim to draw swords for you. I told them this world would just keep making what's in me…what's in that kid…and they'd do NOTHING to stem the tide of it. They'd do NOTHING. And call it GOOD. This world will drown in their GOOD. And this time, there won't be any ark." The Lord said. "You'd allow it…they'd embrace it…I won't stand for it…I'm the REAL Good Lord…"_

_Silence again, as it crystallized in the Lord's brain. He'd promised to become stronger…but that wasn't good enough. The only way to keep the heavens from raining down on the mortal coil…_

…_the only way was to be in charge of them. Not what lay beyond, but what was here and now. Something that didn't think that the way to save the world was to try and save everyone. That had never worked and would never work. Whether God was there or not was irrelevant. He didn't understand what he'd made. He was off in some higher dimension, separated by his omnipotence, and the ones in this world who had power beyond the basic mortal template either spent their time championing what he supposedly stood for or trying to tear it down. It was all pointless. Shadow boxing._

_The world had to be saved, fixed. By someone who actually understood the problems, who knew what gears to strip and what gears to oil. Someone who actually comprehended the pain of his creations and just how it affected their virtues and their vices. Where the lines were, and where the lines no longer mattered._

"…_A middle man." The Lord breathed. "THAT'S what's needed…heh. God needs a middle man. How…impractical."_

_Reaching down, the Lord yanked the cloth off the alter and began tearing it up. The voice had gone so quiet the Lord couldn't tell if he was still there, as he wrapped the makeshift bandages around himself, but his actions shed light on that._

"…_why are you…" The voice said, before it trailed off._

"_Like I said. This place is a false sanctuary. If it can't get anything important done, it should damn sure not complain with what little it can do." The Lord said, clinching the last bandage shut. Turning around, the Lord strolled over to the place where the voice was, hearing the speaker suck in a breath._

"…_what's your name?" The Lord said._

"…_Matthew…Matthew Bartleby."_

"…_can you see me Matthew?" The Lord said. His eyes had adjusted somewhat to the dark, but with how banged up his face was, he still couldn't make out any details on the young man before him beyond his rough height (short) and build (slight). The blob cringed back at the question._

"…_no." The voice said, the sorrow having given way to stark fear. Too much fear to lie effectively, if at all. Matthew couldn't make out any more detail than the Lord could._

_The Lord dropped the metal vial on the pew nearby._

"_This breaks down in the body. Pretty much untraceable. Put it in his drink. Kill or be killed, child. That's your situation. No one is going to help you beyond this. I should know." The Lord said. "Don't get any on you. Throw the vial down the nearest sewer afterwards. And if you want honest advice, kill your worthless mother as well. The system's harsh, but your situation's not only just as bad, it's unchangeable. At least you have odds in the system."_

_Matthew was silent, his breathing low and terrified._

"_Or don't. Leave the poison here. Throw it out. He won't change. This is his life. His happiness, his peace, depends on your misery. Your mother's own peace depends on the same. Different blades, same cut. KILL. HIM. Kill them both. If God has a problem, he can strike me down right now."_

_A beat passed. Then another._

"_Exactly." The Lord said. "This is the world kid. If you don't take, then you will be taken. In every way. But don't worry. The days bring no answers…but the night soon will."_

_With that, the Lord left back out the door. The rest and bandages gave him enough strength to reach a cheap hotel. The Lord picked the lock of an empty room, slept the battle off, and disappeared into the following night._

_He had a lot of work ahead of him, and even grander ambitions._

_He got what he wanted. Sadly, the Barbs would never get anything else. Upon his ascension, the Lord had scoured that part of Jump City clean off the map. What had happened there, and how it had affected him, was meaningless. The area was too corrupted to save, as far as the Lord was concerned, and he'd treated it like the tumor he'd believed it to be._

_Jump City had ultimately chosen to rebuild the area with business warehouses rather than any new living quarters. _

_It was probably the best choice, when all was said and done._

_**Losing is vital…until it defines you. That night, I lost my battle. My base. My first chance to make the proper impression on the children who would become my anathema.**_

_**I gained the realization of what I had to do.**_

_**I had to do more than become stronger. Strength is only part of the battle. What I had to do was become…MORE. I had to become something that could do more than break the world. I had to become its savior, as well as its destroyer.**_

…_**I had to be the one who did not fail where so many others had. How many had made these very same vows, with miniscule differences? How often did they end up broken beneath the fists of the execrable HEROES? I could not fall into their same trap. If I did, the world would continue along its path. Right over the edge into the abyss.**_

…**_the problems were not solely the world's. I'd seen what the Titan pair had done when I'd bedeviled them: they dropped a water tower on my head. In that church, I saw the different vein of sorrow in Matthew (whose story is for another time)…and I saw, later on, that I simply did not care. His misery stirred nothing within me save more negative feeling. What I would do would cause _incalculable _misery. If I could not address it…it would poison anything I built. But I could not bring myself to feel anything for them. It is not who I am. It is not what the world needs._**

_**So in time, I learned another way. A better way.**_

_**Humanity belongs to me. I am the captain of its ship and the master of its soul. Their truth makes me immortal. Their reality drives these children to insane defiance.**_

_**I have…enjoyed the dance.**_

_**But the time has come to put childish things away.**_

* * *

Etemenanki shook once more from the forces being unleashed inside it. Black energies arced between its twisted spires, the air around it seething with forbidden magicks that mankind should have best forgotten.

Jagged stone and black crystal exploded from the depths of the citadel, and a streaking black line carved itself up and around Etemenanki's obelisks before they crashed into one near its pinnacle. Raven's hand dug into the Lord's face, smoke burning up from the grip as her own darkness pressed against the Lord's, the enchantments she'd woven into her powers making the energies akin to a brand.

"…well…done, blackbird." The Lord hissed, one arm restrained by Raven and the other pinned against the wall. "You've improved…considerably. Back when I first achieved power, that blast would have blown your innards out through your spine."

Raven had no verbal reply. Instead, her grasping hand grew brighter.

The crackling power arced off the two nearest adjacent obelisk towers, blasting Raven and tearing her away from the Lord. With a swirl of darkness, the sorceress vanished before the Lord could counter attack. Grimacing, the Lord pushed himself off the wall and looked around, long cloaks of shadow surging out from his body to obscure him, the last of the smoke still wafting from his midnight face.

"An interesting mix of caution and risk." The Lord said, trying to spot the ambush, even taking a second to make sure all the other Titans were still fighting Torment (save Robin, but Robin trying to ambush him in this current location would be suicide for the normal human, and the Lord was pretty sure Robin knew it). "Neither will avail you. I don't know just what kind of story you think you're in, Raven, but I assure you…"

The Lord snapped out a hand at some nearby movement, firing a blast. It proved to be nothing more than dancing shadows. Peering in another direction, the Lord began firing blasts around, above, and below him, even shooting a few into the dark clouds that smoldered above _La Voix_. After several seconds of shooting turned up nothing, the Lord lowered his hands, his gaze slowly sliding around him.

"It won't end the way you think it will."

The Lord felt the power bloom a quarter of a second before the portal opened up directly in the Lord's shadow cloaks, Raven's hand twisting out and grabbing onto the Lord's jaw and face. In a blazing explosion of black and gold, the Lord was blown backwards, the arm disappearing as Raven closed her portal and surged behind the Lord, opening another and fully emerging from it, sending a lashing claw to strike him from behind and send him crashing into another part of Etemenanki. Darkness consumed Raven again, and she re-appeared in the dark chamber she'd knocked the Lord into. It was nearly pitch black, but that mattered little: Raven had great natural night vision, and one spell had made it ten times more potent than a cat's.

"Shut your mouth." Raven said.

"Aha…good. You ARE serious. Striking immediately and saying your clever comment for afterwards…heh. Rather than speak mockery, you seek mockery." The Lord said, as he re-arranged his face. The ramifications struck him a second later. Why was she taking the time to make the comment NOW?

Raven fell into a crouch, slamming her hands on the ground. Her comment had been made for the same reason she'd knocked the Lord into this specific room, as the Lord recognized the movement and looked down at the ground. Ritual triggering.

"You can't have-!"

The Lord stared at the ground. There was nothing beneath his feet but cold stone. He'd been misdirected again. Magic, no matter its form, had always relied on making people look away from what was important, Raven exploding out of her crouch, crossing the room, and slamming her hand against the Lord.

The blast of power sent out a chill that covered the entire room in frost. The Lord snarled in rage and new pain, briefly falling to one knee as dark-blue lines spider-webbed across his body. Raven was thrown backwards, the Titan spinning and landing with grace, the now-icy floor causing her to briefly slide before she stopped.

"In here? No, I can't. I have no idea what rooms you may have trapped. But at home? I had the time. I MADE the time." Raven said, holding up her hand. The flower-shaped mass of stone and glass shone with a radiant sigil, a crippling binding that Raven had successfully managed to lay on her mortal enemy. "You're not the only one who can craft reliquaries, mockery."

"Pardon?"

"You are a joke. In viewpoint, in execution, in everything. Your supposed name is a lie."

"…heh. Let the punishment fit the crime, blackbird? So what did you do?"

Raven blasted the Lord right off his feet. In the process, the Lord discovered the purpose of her spell, when he tried to teleport and found himself unable to. Violently slammed into the wall, unable to warp away, Raven flew in and began slashing at the Lord with dark talons. Points of glowing light tipped the claws as she rent and tore at the shadow-god, her jaw set and her eyes glistening with cold fury. When the Lord tried to get away, she grabbed him and slammed him into the wall again, thrusting out her hand and firing a needle of darkness directly at his face.

The Lord's movement was a complete blur as he snapped up his hand, grabbed Raven's attack, and snuffed it out of existence before he slashed the same hand out. The sorceress felt a horrible burning sensation pass an inch from her face as she recoiled backwards, stopping after ten feet and gathering her power around her.

"Good. You've ensured you're not a disappointment."

The Lord reached into his own darkness and drew out a sword that seemed as big as Raven. Ugly, twisted barbs erupted from the blade's length, further dark runes igniting on the blade itself.

"Can you bear the consequences of such actions?"

Raven just tried to blow the Lord's head off again. The Lord blurred to the side to dodge, and then, laughing, ran in to hack the Titan to pieces.

* * *

Robin felt the forces of the battle between his teammate and enemy jolt through his bones as he infiltrated the tower. He dearly wished he could go help, but he and Raven hadn't spent all this time working out plans for him to throw a monkey wrench into them. Raven knew what she was doing. The Lord might have outstripped her in raw power, but her skill, experience, and motivation all surpassed him. For now, she could handle this alone.

Worst came to worst…he'd avenge her. They all would.

Of course, between being unable to help against the Lord, and being unable to really help against Torment after he'd absorbed most of Robin's weapons, the Titan leader found himself in something of a bind. He'd infiltrated Etemenanki to provide support to his teammates, but as the Lord had told Marissa, there was little he could sabotage. To be more specific, there was little he could discern that would be useful to sabotage, rather than do nothing or alert defenses to his presence. Robin would say he hated magical towers, except he could count the number of times he'd had to infiltrate explicitly magical locations on one hand. So he'd switched gears.

The tower's innards were eerily empty, lacking even Abhorred guards. Robin suspected a lot of the construction of the citadel had been meant for power direction and focus, like if a typical skyscraper had been merged with the large hadron collider. But, based on the robots they had fought, Robin was certain that he, Raven, and the Lord were not the only occupants. The trick would be discovering where the final person was, as there were no maps.

Fortunately, Robin knew enough about architecture to puzzle out, from the building's structure, that with all the design directed towards efficiency, somewhere near the center, on the upper levels, made the most sense. Blocking out the distant sounds of combat (and sometimes not so distant sounds), Robin made his way through the winding tunnels and staircases. It was the staircases that clinched it for him. All the Genocide members could get around without them: the fact that they were there meant there was someone who needed them.

When he spied the room, he knew he was close. Not just because it was lit, unlike so much of Etemenanki, which he'd had to use the NVD setting in his mask to get around. There was also the fact that, based on how the light entered the hallway, the room was quite large. After a quick scan to check for any ambushes, the Titan leader made his way to the entrance of the room, shutting off his light magnifiers and taking a few seconds for his eyes to adjust before he stepped in.

The room wasn't just big, it was massive, at least the size of a football field. It was also empty, the walls and floor blank…

Save for the middle of the left wall, which contained a computer system that rivaled the ones the Titans used back at the tower. Said system had been shut down, however, the chair in front of it empty. Robin sprinted his way over and felt the chair. Still some trace warmth. Someone had been here recently…

Then the entrance Robin had used slammed shut, a stone door sliding closed with a dull, echoing thud. Robin turned around, mildly cursing himself for only taking a brief glance up when he'd entered. Above the hallway was an observation room, its structure covered in metal and crystalline shards, a slightly darker tinted window giving away its purpose. Robin couldn't see a thing inside, and he didn't feel like wasting any of the few weapons he still had to test the glass consistency. Instead, he just looked up at the observation chamber, occasionally flicking his gaze around for more movement.

"Hello Marissa." Robin said. "Never thought these would be the circumstances we'd meet again under…though to be fair…I thought you'd died during the incident with Bartleby. You clearly didn't…and that's a good thing. I hate not being able to keep my promises."

There was silence. Robin was fairly certain he wasn't talking to himself, though.

"…what has _he _promised you?"

"…a life." The voice said from the speakers. "Not…an excuse of one…where I'm locked up…tortured…for something that wasn't my fault."

Robin considered her words. Human and superhuman interaction tended to be messiest over points of law. Marissa had something of a point. Her father was as much to blame for her crimes…and the Lord had taken an already screwed-up situation and made it a hundred times worse. Robin knew he was crossing a minefield, and the smart thing to do would be to just take Marissa out before she could unleash some kind of defense on him.

Robin refused the easy route. If he was going to forgive Noel, Marissa deserved the same, and even more. The Lord had screwed with his teammate's head for one night, and the end result spoke for itself. Who knew what had happened to Marissa in a far greater span of time?

Immediately going after her 'master' wouldn't work. Robin needed another angle.

"…is that why he killed your father?"

"He brought it on himself." Marissa said, answering far quicker than Robin had expected. The Titan leader went with it.

"…Marissa…I saw the crime scene. There wasn't just anger there, and hate. It was…desecration. It was the kind of vile that…well, makes you wonder a few things about where the right thing becomes the wrong thing." Robin said. "Marissa…the Lord makes a lot of claims. He's even right about a few. But…if his solution when confronted with something bad is to engage in even worse behavior…"

"He deserved it."

"Maybe he deserved something. But not that. Your father couldn't fight back…and the Lord used that. Is that what you wanted? For your father to be as helpless as you were? Or is that what _he _wanted? Did he make excuses afterwards? Did he ever put his money where his mouth is? Or did he say one thing, and then do what _he _wanted to do? If he gets something that gives him that same power over this whole world…are you certain that his grand ambition and desire for humanity to ascend to the greatest heights will overcome the compulsion he gave into with your father?"

"…Why should he have had any advantages…when he gave none…"

"He shouldn't have. But the Lord…he couldn't stop at simple retribution. He had to make an atrocity out of your father, Marissa. Did you want that? Or just payment for sins due?"

"…you don't know…know anything…" The voice said, but Robin could hear the discordant alarm beneath the words. "He helped me…got…get…rid of him…fixed me…"

"Marissa. Do you know just what the expression 'fight fire with fire' means? Where it comes from?" Robin said. "It's from a tactic of carefully burning a smaller area to stop a larger fire in its tracks. Remove the fuel. Tell me the truth. Is that what the Lord does? Is that what he wants? Is that…what he'll do? You know him better than anyone. We're his enemies, our viewpoints might be biased. He's your benefactor. You see how he does things. What does he SAY? Then what does he DO?"

"He said he would help me, and he has! He gave me a second chance! You just want to throw me in jail!"

"I don't…"

"You serve the system that wants to hurt me for what happened at that school! The system that let it happen! He'll tear it down! Replace it with something better!"

"Marissa…if what he did to your father is how he works…is there going to be anything left when he's done? If, in the heat of things, he loses control, as he's demonstrated before…are you really safe?"

"…he doesn't avenge others! He lets them do it themselves!"

"…If that's true Marissa…then what do you remember?"

"He's dead. That's all that matters."

"Marissa…you've built so much. How much of everything, in the end, is as simple as that?"

"…if you surrender now, you don't have to die."

It was Robin's turn to be silent.

"The Lord's not a liar. You said yourself he has the right idea. He wants good people, people can accomplish their full potential. For the new world. It's…what's best, Robin."

"…Marissa…do you really think he'd _let _us join him? Even if we all laid down our arms and pledged ourselves to his service…do you really think _he _could let the hate go? The same hate he calls practicality?"

"The Lord's not a liar…"

The Birdarang slammed into the dense plastic that served as Marissa's window, ricocheting off and back into Robin's hand. If he was correct (and he had been) about how strong the barrier was, he couldn't afford to waste his weapons. After Torment's theft, he didn't have many left.

He also knew that this conversation had hit a dead end, or rather, a mobius loop. He'd sent out some feelers to get an idea of what was needed, but it wasn't something he could fix here, at least not in the current conversational situation. The best option would be to get Marissa out of here and start her deprogramming away from the Lord. He had a feeling it would be a lot easier said than done.

But after how hard she'd been done by, and how little he'd done in comparison, Robin didn't care.

"I'm sorry Marissa. He is. And I mean to keep my promise." Robin said. "Even if you think you don't want it any more."

There was no answer. Robin didn't expect one. He kept his eyes and ears open regardless.

The instinct served him once more, as the noise started behind him.

Metallic grinding and hissing crossed the dead silence, and then, with Robin turning around to watch, a giant shadow peeled itself from the dark corner of the room.

No. Not a shadow. This thing had substance…but that was virtually all Robin could tell about it. The thing, whatever it was, was pitch black. Not the color, it itself. Light seemingly did not make contact with it, leaving it a blank silhouette with only occasional details, like long spindly limbs. All Robin could really tell for certain was that it was at least twenty feet fall, and based on its footsteps, weighed at least three tons (and carried itself like it weighed three pounds). Everything else was rendered oblique…including, and this was the worst, depth perception. With light completely negated, Robin had no idea how close, or far away, the machine was. Even switching to infra-red gave him nothing. The creature was a void, consuming all visual wavelengths.

It was impossible. No cloaking device, no kind of stealth technology, could completely and utterly negate light. That was like trying to make a square circle; geometry and physics didn't allow it, let alone logic. It reeked of magic, a skin of darkness granted by Marissa's so-called Lord, turning her giant weapon from a traditional brute force machine to a literal killing shadow.

**JABBERWOCKY 100% OPERATIONAL. BEGINNING NEUTRALIZATION.**

A giant machine where you had no idea how close or far away it was until it actually hit you. Robin didn't want it to hit him. Even with Cyborg's custom protection, one good direct hit from something this size would probably finish him, one way or the other…

…And why was Marissa piloting…it…

Of course. All those robots the Titans had fought outside had to have come from somewhere. Robin had never seen the Lord using any of Marissa's mind-warping technology, and Raven had not reported any use of it herself, even to lie (that would have made, in a way, a far better cover for Noel's 'crimes' than what the truth was). It seemed that there had been more to Marissa's talents than what she'd shown, and the Lord had clearly developed it to exploit for his own use.

Exploit, even as he filled her head with his own lies. A normal life. Peace.

His promise loomed even further away, it seemed. One step at a time, and he'd have to _make _good time. Extending his staff, Robin gave it a brief twirl and waited.

The Jabberwocky's lone weakness was that it made a large amount of noise as it moved. With that being the only way for Robin to tell where it was, he broke into a run. He couldn't really tell how fast or how slow the machine was (Cyborg probably could have measured the Doppler effect, but he wasn't here), and hence had no choice but to overcompensate. The change in air pressure made him realize he'd just avoided a roundhouse swing, a giant clawed arm lashing for his back. Robin planted his staff and pole-vaulted forward some more, a black tail crashing down where he'd been a second before. Heading for the wall, Robin spun around, trying to watch the shadow…

It began to crouch. Too obvious a tell. Robin waited two seconds, then ran forward and slid. The Jabberwocky flew over him with its leap, slamming up against the wall, Robin spinning back up to his feet…

The machine did its own acrobatics, briefly clinging to the wall and then bouncing off like a monkey, crashing down onto the floor and getting back in range quicker than Robin had anticipated. The Titan's luck then ran out, as a giant clawed hand glanced his side when he tried to dodge away, his hip bone wrenching painfully as he was knocked flying. Robin buried the pain and landed on his feet, mentally running through his gear. He did have 'marking' Birdarangs, but he hadn't brought them with him, preferring to stock himself with more combat-oriented gear. A rare tactical oversight, but Robin was only human.

The shadow came for him, though Robin could only tell this by the noise. Attempting to cartwheel away, Robin ended up coming so close to being struck by the machine's hand that he was knocked out of his dodge. He quickly recovered, and finally chanced an attack, hurling the same Birdarang he'd tossed at Marissa at the shadows.

It hit…and promptly bounced off, falling to the floor. The shadow cloaking did not flicker, the mass turning around (or so Robin thought).

A loud cracking, shifting noise came from the machine, and suddenly wheels of dark crystalline metal flew from within the shadow, giant spiked tire-like projectiles. Which promptly lit on fire.

Robin dodged them without issue, before he threw himself on the ground. His luck held, as the Jabberwocky ended up lunging right over him. Robin got back up, and then the flaming shrapnel wheels came for him again, having bounced off the wall. They weren't a proper attack. They were a distraction, forcing him to have to not only dodge the shadow machine, but their flaming forms as well. Robin could tell from how they moved they were far too dense for him to stop with a physical blow, and he lacked the equipment to disable them.

For a death trap, it ranked among the better, or worse ones.

It was time to be wondrous.

* * *

What really got Savior was that he wasn't even breathing all that hard.

The most important aspect of a superhero, one that they all shared, far more often than not, wasn't how much power you had, or combat practice, or courage, or sense. It was how much cardio training you had. Power-based endurance and adrenaline could carry you far, but those aspects were not limited to the heroic side. What _was_, nearly all the time, was repetitive training exercises designed to not just increase strength, but stamina. Many a villain could be outfought, outfoxed, or simply outlasted, if you had more fuel in your tank than them.

When Savior had first started, he could fight at high intensity for maybe two minutes, and twice that if the adrenaline surges lined up the right way. If the Troika hadn't beaten him to a pulp in his first real battle, he probably would have ended up at their mercy from sheer exhaustion shortly thereafter. It had been a lifetime since then, several in a way, and Savior liked to think he was half as wise for how much older he felt.

He was still here.

But he'd still just helped his team fight his way through two mini-armies, and then three super-powered minions, and now he was facing one last minion, the old dragon-saw, who might be more powerful than the previous three put together. There was endless fields of dust, smoke, and worse, not to mention never-ending combat…

Yet he barely felt winded. Even with Raven's healing, that said something. Not bad for a bunch of snot-nosed kids.

Of course, things could yet change.

Then again, things had already changed. Savior was reminded of that when he helped yank Terra out of the way of a storm of corrupted Birdarangs, only for her to yank away from _him _and fly off on her rock, circling the war zone. Savior, by this point, couldn't tell if she was the last holdout among his teammates in regards to that terrible night, or just the only one who wasn't too polite to hide how they really felt. Ryce had warned him of this, unabated by his silence. Nevertheless the blind faith she had in him did little to comfort...he knew far too well the kinds of beings she put that same of stock in.

All this, all they'd endured…and it just seemed like the battle was lost before it even started. Savior tried to block it out, but little things like that in the midst of the carnage made it hard.

Bastards. All of it, of them. Perhaps even him.

So be it. If he was destined to forever bear the mark of bastard, then he'd make sure his enemies knew that, as overtly as possible.

Starting with trying to yank out Torment's eyes, the Titan sprinting and leaping over near the Genocide member, firing off his lines into Torment's features as he recovered from being distracted by Beast Boy.

"ARH! ARE YOU SERIOUS? REALLY? REALLY?" Torment yelled, clawing at his face. Savior just kept trying to blind his enemy. "I DON'T NEED EYES TO SEE YOU!"

The blast lanced from Torment's pointed finger, Savior leaping to dodge. Torment used the Shimmer against him instead, yanking on it with his other hand and screwing up Savior's leap. The dark blue blast struck the Titan, but instead of exploding or piercing through him, a blue field sprang up around him, Savior going as still as a statue, a look of abject horror on his face.

"Also saw _The Incredibles_!" Torment said, and swung Savior into a nearby chunk of rock, the beam entrapping Savior and rendering him unable to move or defend himself. When Beast Boy charged back in as a gorilla, Torment bashed his teammate into him. Looking at his arm as it started to glow red, Torment snorted dismissively and released the Titan, sending him flying face-first into another mass of rock. He thought he was beyond such dull issues like overheating.

"I actually saw the Incredibles! As in, we teamed up with them!" Gauntlet yelled, punching Torment from the side and running off, Starfire flying around him and tossing a single Starbolt. Torment caught it between his hands and snuffed it out, drawing a frustrated curse from the alien before she glanced at her teammate.

"Gauntlet, are you positive you are not confusing the weird garnishes of the baked tomato breads dream for the reality again?"

"God it sucks being the meta one sometimes."

Terra tossed a giant rock at Scalpel, holding it together with her will so the alien could kick the boulder towards Torment without shattering it. Torment sliced it in half with a karate chop, of all things, but Terra had figured he would. Having flown around his flank, she tossed up the diamond she'd used with the fake Raven and shattered it to pieces, firing out the blades and sending them slashing all over Torment's body. She actually seemed to get somewhere, as Torment recoiled from the attack and actually flailed at the blades for a few seconds before he slashed out his hand. Terra felt a greater force override her geokinesis as the diamond daggers were yanked right into the ground, before Torment turned to the young girl. He did not look pleased.

"Not bad. But the Lord giveth so that I may taketh…awayeth…from youeth…people were dumb in the past." Torment said, and unleashed more cloned Birdrangs.

Terra summoned another sea boulder she had laid nearby, broke it into pieces, and blocked every single one. After Robin, Torment's clumsy projectiles might have well have had NERF written on them.

"You're like Santa Claus! You poor fat bastard!" Terra taunted.

"Ho ho." Torment said, and showed the gravity cannon he'd turned his other arm into before he used it to pancake Terra into the ground. "Poor flat bastard."

"SHE'S A GIRL!" Beast Boy roared, leaping in as a tiger.

"That insult's masculine only by convention." Torment said, and matrix-dodged under Beast Boy before he kicked him in the ribs and sent him flying away. "Poor cat bastard."

* * *

Back in the Tower, Ryce groaned loudly, slamming a tray of half-frosted pink cupcakes down, "One more pun and fudge Dad's rules, m'defyin' physics and punchin' this guy in the throat myself. Even _if _he's a little hilarious."

* * *

Morgue calmly slid out from behind her cover, taking a knee and aiming her gun at Torment. Torment smirked at her and aimed his own, which was promptly slashed by Scalpel. Having (momentarily) discarded his larger weapons in exchange for his scimitars, the alien whirled around Torment and slashed him across the side before leaping away. Torment aimed his gravity cannon, but failed to hit anything as Savior literally sprang up behind Torment, tossed out the Shimmer, and yanked Scalpel back into him, the alien kicking Torment in the chest. Torment recovered scarily quick, and with one crashing blow, knocked Scalpel to the ground in front of him. A blast from one of Torment's back spines drove Savior away, and after smacking the Blacktrinian across the face with his gravity cannon, the Genocide member aimed the weapon at point-blank range and fired.

The ground shattered beneath Scalpel, the alien falling to his knees as he was driven a foot deep into the rock, his swords being smashed into the ground as well.

"…Your point?" Scalpel asked. Then he punched Torment in the crotch as hard as he could. If his enemy was going to be so kind to make it level to his fist, Nigel would oblige. White lines grabbed the Blacktrinian as Savior returned and yanked him (and his swords) away, even as Torment deeply winced.

"…didn't hurt."

Morgue promptly shot him in the head. THAT hurt, and with a snarling roar Torment turned and drove the ten square feet of rock the undertaker had been located on so deep into the ground none of the Titans could see the bottom of the pit.

Morgue, fortunately, had been picked up and carried away by Starfire.

"I can fly too, you know!" Sophie mildly complained.

"Can you fly faster than the speed of sound?"

"…I don't know, I never tried."

"You all right?" Savior asked Beast Boy, having landed next to him. Beast Boy gave him a grim look, but also flashed a brief thumbs up. Terra had vanished from where she'd been 'crushed', and Beast Boy turned into a dragonfly to avoid detection and try and find her. Gauntlet, in the meantime, popped up behind Torment, lashing out a yellow energy arm…

That tapped him on the shoulder. Then Gauntlet ran away. Noel mentally noted that one would think one would be relieved to turn around and NOT get sneak-attacked.

Torment just looked surprised, and then he got angry, blasting at where Gauntlet had been, then where he thought another Titan was going to be, and when his attempted battle-awareness bore no fruit, the villain leapt into the air, spinning and firing a spreading wave of dark energy blasts, before he righted himself and directed two final red ones into the ground with his hands, explosions tearing apart the battlefield beneath him.

Then someone tapped him on the shoulder again.

Torment whirled around, slashing an arm and cleaving the air behind him with a dark, arcing energy blade. He hit nothing, and with a snarl of fury, he began spinning around and firing more of the same dark blades across the sky. He ended up losing his head so badly that he sliced one of the spires of Etemenanki in half. That was enough to make him stop, his eyes going wide.

Starfire, having stayed directly behind Torment the entire time, chose this moment to blast him in the back as hard as she could. She didn't like it, but she hadn't started this war, and she knew its rules. Torment tumbled downward with an angry yell…

The stasis beam flashed out, catching the alien and freezing her in place. Torment didn't throw her at anything, though. Instead he corrected his position and yanked her forward towards him.

"Enough of this bullshit, you stupid _troq_." Torment said, black claws erupting from his primary and middle fingers. Starfire couldn't even widen her eyes, Torment moving to slash her throat…

Gauntlet had meant to throw himself into the pair, specifically Torment's back. Gauntlet thought pretty well under pressure. Gauntlet's utilization of geometry under pressure, however, was somewhat lacking. And so Gauntlet ended up flying past the pair instead.

"Heeyoo-heyhowsitgoing-okayseeyoulater!"

Torment jerked his head to follow Gauntlet…which let Cyborg blast him in the side with a powerful sonic cannon blast. The stasis beam broke, and Starfire added to Torment's woes by punching him into the ground.

"…um…I love it when a plan comes together." Gauntlet said.

An explosion blasted upward from Torment's landing spot, the Genocide member once again emerging lacking injury, but also a good deal of poise. He fired a blast at Cyborg's form before him, but the Titan just ducked under it.

"Oh this doesn't mean anything. You're not about to start turning this around on me, Cyborg. I've learned PLENTY from history!"

"If you'd really learned anything, you'd still be in jail getting a degree."

"Are you SHITTING ME? Do you have the gall to act like you did me some sort of FAVOR? I was a teenager, like YOU were! Except I didn't fuck up so bad that I ended up getting turned into a cyborg, I found a device that instantly gave you superpowers! DO YOU KNOW WHAT MOST PEOPLE WOULD DO WITH THAT KIND OF DEVICE? All I wanted to do was rob some jewelry stores and lock some horns, and you SEND ME TO JAIL! Do you REALLY THINK that if you'd never turned into a Terminator-lite, that you wouldn't have done almost the EXACT SAME THING? Do you even REMEMBER what being a teenager is like? Do you know what prison is like? Do you REALLY THINK you can get any sort of a life out of it? YOU TOOK AWAY ANY CHANCE OF ME HAVING ONE! It's between this and washing dishes until I keel over dead of a heart attack in my fifties! Between that and the Lord, I'LL TAKE THE LORD! AND IT'S YOUR OWN DAMN FAULT!"

"So what I'm hearing is, 'Sure, I did bad things, but I got sent to jail for doing bad things! Me! I'm too special for jail, because I'm me!'" Gauntlet said.

"I'LL SHOW YOU _**SPECIAL**_!" Torment roared, his voice taking on an ugly growl as he aimed his arm at Gauntlet, his back spires breaking off and merging with the limb as it opened up into an arm cannon, a deep crimson flame erupting inside it.

Gauntlet moved to dodge.

Torment fired, and the beam CURVED to strike him.

"SHIT!"

The Shimmer grabbed Gauntlet and yanked him up into the air. Even through his shield and his boots, Gauntlet felt the heat of the blast sear his feet. Torment snarled again and tried to reverse the blast, but he either lacked the power or the finesse, and the energy hit the ground and set off a chain of violent explosions that finally ended at the edge of the island, a plume of boiling water marking the attack's end.

"…oh fuck." Torment said as he realized what he'd just done. Cyborg promptly blasted him out of the boots he didn't have.

"Useful thing about a hit and run type strategy. Makes you more on the ball to do things like that." Savior commented, setting Gauntlet down.

"Yeah…also, someone should tell Darkseid this guy's stealing his beam shtick."

"No, Darkseid would have hit you with the Omega Effect even if I'd tossed you into orbit."

"Nah, I'd have been fine. And I would have gotten to be a caveman and a pilgrim."

"…I'm just going to assume that somewhere, that makes sense." Savior said, and moved back in to resume being a bastard.

* * *

Ryce chuckled to herself, trying to ignore the nervous wriggling her hands did as she clutched her oven mittens in them. An insane part of her head found itself thinking that it was almost like old times again, before she stomped it down and reminded herself of the seriousness of the situation.

She refocused her sight once more towards another of her friends…and paused as she saw what had caught that particular one's attention.

"…What the _hell_ is that in the basement?"

* * *

Something was in the basement.

Even in the middle of all her concentration, all her cold rage, Raven could still feel it. Something unnatural, something horrible, something the Lord had chained before driving blades into it to madden it even further. Normally, Raven would have devoted some effort to puzzling out just _what _was setting off her empathy, but not this time. Not only because she was in for the greatest fight of her life, either. She also couldn't give an indication, ANY indication, that the 'background noise' bothered her. Or else the Lord might turn it to his advantage. She was already boxing outside her weight class. No sense giving her opponent weighted gloves.

Another shudder ran through Etemenanki as the Lord crashed through another wall, his giant sword cutting through the stone and crystal like they weren't there. Raven had rode out the blow, deflecting it just enough so that it blasted through the wall and carried her with it. Spinning away from the Lord, Raven seized one end of her cape and thrust it out, like a matador calling to a bull. A symbol lit up on the underside of her cloak, and the Lord immediately fired a blast at it. The symbol was destroyed…which was what Raven wanted, drawing another with her free hand in the air and then crushing it. Dark fangs manifested around the Lord and then clamped down on him, golden points glowing on end of the teeth as they bit into the Lord. With a snarl of pain, the Lord pulled the maw off of him, shattering it with a pulse of his own darkness before he turned and fired at Raven again. This time, he missed, and Raven slashed into him again, her dark energies manifesting again as bird-esque talons.

"Nice work. Think you can keep it up?" The Lord asked, charging in again, his form a blur. His sword was stopped in mid-swing, Raven holding out her hands and blocking it with arcs of energy from them. The Lord bore down on the blade, and Raven in turn reinforced her own defenses.

"Heh. Remember when we first met, blackbird? I still remember the first thing you said to me. You threatened to break me in half. Wouldn't your life have been easier if you'd actually had the stones to do it?" The Lord said. "Bet you'd give your eyeteeth for another chance at that. Because now? You're toothless."

Raven wrenched the sword out of the Lord's hand. It exploded into shadows, the Lord sliding backwards and waving his left arm in a circle. A malefic eye opened up around him.

"Aye?"

The eye did not fire a beam. Instead it vanished, a mere targeting aspect of a deadly attack, and the Lord slashed his arm down, a mammoth whip of blood-colored energy erupting and lashing down on Raven. Her shields failed, and she was hammered through two walls before she found herself outside in the open air again.

The Lord surged out after her, his hand seizing onto her face, ramming her head-first through another wall and then down through two more floors. The pain of the beating was nothing compared to the pain in Raven's face, the skin on her face and neck beginning to turn a cold, dead gray around the Lord's hand.

"_I_, on the other hand, have never lost my bite."

Raven could have cast a spell, or matched the Lord's corrupting energies as he tried to drain all the vital energy from her body. She could have put the Lord in a joint lock, using her powers to keep him solid, or phased through the floor to try and get him to lose his grip.

Instead, she just kneed him in the groin as hard as she could. She figured the Lord wouldn't see THAT coming. He had nothing there to damage…but a massive burst of solar-tinged force released on impact made that point irrelevant and sent the Lord flying back upwards through the wrecked ceiling. Raven rolled out of the way before the tumbling debris landed on her, runes and sigils flickering across her costume and skin as she re-gathered herself, the Lord having left an ugly gray brand on her features.

"Bite _me_."

"Ah…FINALLY got a reaction out of you! It was getting dull talking to myself!"

"You can stop trying to be irreverently chatty. I can feel your pain, monster."

Raven blurred away herself as the Lord crashed down, his blade slashing a gigantic V in the ground that extended to the walls, black energy burning from the 'echo-wounds'.

"Feeling's mutual. In EVERY aspect, blackbird." The Lord said. Raven's only response was a slight glow on her face, the sorceress magically revitalizing the dead flesh. "Oh, you are good. I will admit, you have come so very far from that night. But you know in your heart it's not enough."

* * *

"For _GOD'S SAKE, STOP QUASI-FLIRTING!_" Ryce finally snapped in disbelief.

She had been surprised by what she had found chained by the Lord—but more surprised she hadn't noticed until now.

Now her attention returned to their fight, and she was extremely bemused by the double-meaning most of the Lord's comments had. The worst was that the man was honestly oblivious to it.

* * *

Raven's magic went from healing to killing, the Titan unleashing multiple blasts at the Lord. The Lord sprinted to the side, returning fire, the duo tearing the room to shreds.

"I speak of the past, let's speak of the future! You claim you'll be free of my interference, in the same breath you call me a liar! Who's lying here? Your whole life is built on moral absolutes! Every time you've been faced with any kind of gray, you've tried to force it into a starker contrast! It's how you can deal with the world, and all its failings! You can't just get off the ride now, Raven. Noel killed your teammates. For YOU. They won't forgive him. They CAN'T. At the end of the day, when all is said and done…they insist on good and evil. If I may use a rather crude quote in new context, once you go black, they won't let you go back."

Raven slashed out her arm, a straight blade of dark power flying at the Lord. The Lord raised a hand in turn, and was promptly caught off guard when the blade not only dipped lower, but manifested a glowing edge that sliced right through his forearm before slamming into his chest, knocking him into the wall before it exploded, blasting him back through it. Raven followed him through, discovering this new room had a mirrored floor and semi-mirrored walls.

Only she reflected in the dark glass. The Lord only appeared before her, the seething darkness on his chest calming before his arm began to re-grow.

"What kind of future do you really have? What do you do? Leave him? You know full well how weak he is. What he'll do to try and salve the pain. Stay with him? Then you can be an outcast alongside him, a pariah among the community that claims to be so just, so moral…and yet is utterly merciless to those who cross the line. And even if you forgive him, he will never forgive himself. It's why I chose him, after all. The weak link among my enemies. Their undoing. And yours. If you try and let this pass…or if you try to punish it…how long will it be before Trigon's blood is whispering in your ears again?"

Raven just floated there.

Approximately one second after the Lord stopped talking, all her reflections raised their arms and blasted him with gold-tainted darkness. He really should have known better that Raven wasn't just going to stand there and let him ramble. The Lord fell to his knees, but a dark chuckle echoed across the room from him.

"You're not disproving my point. That COULD have killed me…maybe, but you didn't strike to kill. You struck to hurt. Forget how long before…your lineage is _already _speaking through you. How fitting. Work so hard to redeem others, forget that the world never forgave you."

Raven had random reflections fire the second shot. It didn't work, as the Lord leapt and spun, the blasts tearing through his cloaks as he slashed the air with his sword. Every single mirror shattered, the Lord sending the jagged shards flying at his enemy. Raven teleported in turn, reappearing behind the Lord, her glowing hand lashing out for his face.

The Lord grabbed her not-as-glowing wrist before she could make contact, smoke erupting from his hand and face.

"Sorry, blackbird. But the downside of your clever tricks means you're like a great big shining beacon to me."

Raven promptly propelled the golden flecks on her palm onto the Lord's face. He recoiled with a snarl, Raven pulling her hand free. The Lord slashed out, and the black mirror shards flew back from where they'd gone, homing in on Raven, who manifested a sphere around her upon which the deadly storm broke.

The Lord glared at this, literally ripping part of his own face off and tossing it aside as solar magic disintegrated it. His features reformed, and the Lord and Raven stared each other down.

"In some remote corner of the universe…"

Raven flashed towards the Lord, the shadow god intercepting her projected black dagger of energy via his sword.

"Poured out and glittering in innumerable star systems…"

Raven broke away and lashed out at the Lord with another angry claw. The Lord jumped, flipped upside down, and landed on the ceiling of the room before he hurled his sword into the proper floor. It promptly transformed into a mass of spikes, forcing Raven into the air.

"There once was a star where clever animals invented knowledge…"

Raven lashed out with her power. The Lord matched it, blazing black arcs pressing against each other, firing off sparks that punched fist-sized holes in the floor, walls, and spikes.

"That was the highest and most mendacious minute of 'world history'-"

The Lord spun off the ceiling. The spikes vanished from the floor and abruptly erupted from the same ceiling, forcing Raven downward and breaking her concentration, and by extent their beam deadlock. The tips of some of her hair sizzled off as she dodged the Lord's devouring blast, landing and throwing up a shield to fully block it. He hammered it into her for a few seconds more before cutting it off.

"Yet only a minute."

Raven fired a blast at the Lord. He deflected it and fired one back. Raven altered its trajectory and slowed it down before snuffing it between her hands. The Lord smirked. He did so love that trick.

"After nature had drawn a few breaths, the stars grew cold. And the clever animals had to die." The Lord concluded.

"Nietzsche." Raven said.

"I'd be quite surprised if you hadn't recognized him."

"And I'd be quite surprised if you _hadn't_ joined the latest ranks of the mad using his philosophy to justify your hateful, psychotic enmity towards life."

"Ah Raven…so many years and-"

Raven dashed forward.

The Lord did the same, and faster, black claws sprouting on his hand.

Raven swallowed her cry as the Lord found a hole in her guard and struck, his power ripping into her body and soul as he tore past, and through her. Blazing back and forth around her, each pass accompanied by a slash, the Lord stopped after two seconds and threw up a hand. A second, larger clawed shadow hand rose up beneath Raven, carrying her up into the ceiling and to the spikes that awaited her.

Raven let out a defiant yell, and dark energies manifested on her skin. The spikes shattered on them, the hand that drove her upward recoiling…

So that a horde of shrieking black skulls could follow it from the black pool the Lord had manifested under Raven during his barrage, biting and hammering into the young woman before she was driven up through the roof.

There was silence for a moment.

One drop of blood fell. The Lord grabbed it, letting it float in his hand before he burned it to ash.

"Lot more where that came from." The Lord said, and followed, throwing a ball of energy in front of him that exploded once it passed through the hole. The Lord flew up from the smoke, 360 degree vision immediately spotting Raven's prone form.

This time, the reliquary was a mass of roots and what appeared to be glowing berries wrapped around Raven's hand as she thrust it out.

"_Nemus Iratus Effluvium!"_

The Lord saw the glowing spheres coming, but his attempt to deflect them failed. The orbs sank into him, and the Lord jerked back and screamed, greenish-gold light erupting from him and washing over the whole room. The shadow god then vomited up a mess of black mist and twisting, writhing liquid, his body twisting and jerking for nearly four seconds before he stabilized. When he looked up, any good mood in his eyes had vanished.

"So you decided to-"

The Lord cut off his sentence and lanced towards Raven, shrugging off whatever new binding she had laid on him. Let her try to lock down his powers, especially with such unrefined sorcery. She'd pay equally in the end, and he had more than she could…

Raven teleported out of the way. The use of these artifacts was not without cost. Utilizing them this way caused a backlash, one that _had _affected her, but the fact that she was not the _target _of them made all the difference. She could endure the further hardships the feedback caused her.

Especially when it let her appear behind the Lord, her bloody hand holding her first 'stone-bloom' artifact. The blood flew off her hand, forming into a sigil, and when the Lord turned around with a slash of his sword, she leapt over it and slammed the sigil into his face.

More green and blue light exploded from the touch, and the Lord scrambled back, clawing at his features, even as blue beams of energy exploded from within his body. Raven floated back, placing her curios back into the secret pockets of her cloak.

"What's wrong, mockery? You look a little green, and blue, around the gills."

"YOU FUCKING BITCH!" The Lord roared, and hurled his sword at Raven. Raven deflected it with one swing of her own arm, but the Lord followed it up immediately with a storm of destructive blasts, the wall behind Raven caving in as she vanished within them. A moment later, Raven appeared next to the Lord, ducking under the kick he threw and spinning away from the follow-up blast, literally slapping him with a lash of her power and driving him back several steps.

"I'll tear your fucking spine out and _**FEED IT TO YOU."**_ The Lord raged, and threw up his arms, black 'blood' spraying from the gesture and turning into Abhorred. The shadow constructs leapt at Raven like rabid animals…

With a few quick gestures and one literal magic word, Raven dispersed them all.

"You think so highly of yourself. Think with all your power, all your sitting and reading in your little timeless voids, that you're the king of every castle. Do you even consider that anyone could surpass you? Because if not…you're not going to get a chance to learn." Raven said quietly.

The Lord let out a low snarl, even as he felt the bindings dig into him. She's sealed off his teleportation, stolen his ability to absorb vitality…and then she'd built on the warp-binding: the Lord had a deeper sensation of gravity then he'd had a minute ago. She'd probably eliminated his levitation abilities as well, though the Lord didn't exactly want to test it by trying to fly and falling on his face. He was angry enough already.

"All you're doing is making this harder on yourself, child of Azarath. If you really wish to test my wrath…"

Raven literally blew the Lord's face off.

"_**I'M GOING TO FUCKING KILL YOU!" **_The Lord bellowed, blasting across the room. He might not have been able to fly, but he could still run, and he promptly ran Raven down, grabbing her and sending her smashing through the wall behind her, the two flying out of Etemenanki…

Where Raven promptly slapped the Lord away from her again, and he plummeted like a stone.

"Pride does go before a fall."

The Lord fired off a tendril of black energy that yanked him to one of Etemenanki's twisting spires, his feet impaling into the cursed stone before he ran straight up it. There was more than one way to skin a cat, defy gravity, and kill a Titan, and the Lord had several strong possibilities burning in him as he drew level with Raven,

Better yet…two birds with one stone.

Manifesting twin katana-like blades, the Lord leapt off Etemenanki and towards Raven. Raven's cloak flared out as she met him with more arcing energy. The blow rang across the whole island.

* * *

"What does it say when this is preferable to his attempts at pick-up lines…"

She was baking too much, again, Ryce knew. Looking at the second batch of black and

white cupcakes delicately placed in the pattern of a chessboard on the equally monochromatic pastries. It was a stupid and costly nervous habit.

But now, watching Raven and The Lord's exchange through that ever glowing eye, she no longer felt that nervous.

"Ricky, Ricky, Ricky," she shook her head, clicking her tongue in amused resignation at his rage. Fingers dancing in the air above her creations she plucked from the top of one a dark chocolate King piece, "S'always the pretty girls who hit the raw nerves, isn't it?"

Ryce grinned as the decoration's crown snapped off between her teeth and turned her focus to…

* * *

_**MISS MORI!**_

The mental call exploded through Marissa's head, causing her to tense up so much that she nearly directed the Jabberwocky into a wall. Fortunately, Robin was too busy dodging fiery wheels to take advantage or even notice.

_**You're fighting Robin?  
**_"Sir? Um…"

_**Whatever you had planned, throw it out the window. Kill him. Tear that whole part of Etemenanki down if it's needed, abort getting proper combat data, whatever, but KILL. HIM. DEAD.**_

"…Yessir." Marissa said nervously.

_**Good girl. Don't underestimate him. He's a bat-scion, the cream of the crop of mortals. Bigger and meaner than you have ended up under his foot. Don't join that list.**_

"Yes sir." Marissa said, looking at Robin again. If she was going to do this 'properly', she'd need to be able to see (if only so she made sure she utilized the weapons in her machine while they were facing away from her observation post). With the twist of a dial, the tint in her windows lowered until it was clear, Marissa adjusting the lighting in her post to compensate before she called the Jabberwocky over to her side of the room. Robin stayed where he was, still trying to dodge the flaming wheels, which would have normally stopped bouncing around the room by now…if they and the walls hadn't been infused with the Lord's power.

Marissa flicked another switch, and the chemicals injected and mixed within her war machine. Robin dodged another flame-wheel to see the Jabberwocky kneeling down. Another leap…wait no, it was more balancing on its four limbs than tensing its legs…

He felt the heat half a second before the massive gout of fire erupted from within the mechanical beast, spreading out and engulfing the room before it. Robin's eyes widened, and then narrowed as his gaze flicked back and forth, checking his flanks. No flaming wheels immediately closing in towards him.

The other important factor, the one his following action hinged upon, was the fact that he'd traded in his shorter cape for a longer one two years ago. He grabbed it, knelt down, turned away from the fire, and pulled it over him, covering his body completely as he pressed three different studs on his utility belt.

Then the fire consumed him.

Marissa had been unable to see if the flame hit Robin (hence her wide shot to compensate), and her immediate reaction was to check the ceiling, looking for how he may have dodged it. In response, the Jabberwocky stopped its attack, the flame dying out while Marissa tried to both check for an upward attack and get the Jabberwocky back into fighting form.

A few seconds later, Robin walked out of the fire, his black cloak scorched and flapping around him, the flames around him sputtering and dying from lack of fuel. Marissa stared in shock, even as Robin re-adjusted Cyborg's shield settings and how they interacted with his uniform. He'd heard Bruce had done something like this once. With the wide, and hence weaker flame, Robin had figured his best way to avoid it would be to absorb it.

"…I'm noticing an incongruity, with what you just did." Robin said, before dodging out of the way of a flaming wheel. "Are you going to pull out the machine guns now?"

Marissa tried to ignore Robin as she brought the Jabberwocky up, new pieces opening on it, thin cannons extending, dots of light burning on them.

"Half-right." Robin said.

The laser blasts streaked across the room, blowing up where Robin had been standing, the Titan leader having leapt away. Marissa compensated and changed her aim, only for Robin to completely stop on a dime, resulting in her blowing up one of the flaming wheels instead. Firing off his grapple, he swung up to the ceiling and ran across the wall, Marissa alternating between trying to follow him and lead him with her cannons.

Robin leapt off the wall and flipped across the room, Marissa's blasts right on his heels…

Then another flaming wheel exploded as Marissa shot it. Before she could react, another one bounced into her laser's path and blew up. And another. And another. Marissa's eyes went wide, and she finally shut down the lasers before they overheated. There was only one last wheel, and with a careful dodge, Robin lashed out with a pistoning kick, knocking it on its side in a spray of sparks.

He hadn't just dodged all her shots, he'd somehow lead them across the room to take out her previous offense.

"You know this isn't right at all, Marissa." Robin said. "You wanted me to surrender. To live. Someone else just gave the order to kill me, didn't they? What does that say?"

Marissa did not respond, but the fact that the cannons retracted back into the Jabberwocky said it all to him. If she'd really become what her master wanted, she would have locked back onto him and turned him into Swiss cheese.

Then the Jabberwocky rampaged forward again…with one crucial difference, as Marissa watched Robin fire off his grapple again and pull himself to the ceiling with perfect timing. There was no guesswork in this dodge. He had a far better idea where the Jabberwocky was…

Because he'd made markers for himself. The destroyed fiery wheels on the ground, helping him judge what the Jabberwocky's absolute void cloaking stole from him: perspective.

Marissa felt the coldness creep over her. He'd taken his bad situation and turned it to his advantage in seconds. Even as deeply as she knew Robin, there was a difference in reading about it and seeing it in action. Even KNOWING it would be different wasn't enough to compensate for it.

What could she do? She couldn't give the tower orders like the Lord, for the floors to absorb the broken wheels or something. She couldn't mentally contact him and ask him to do it, he seemed busy enough. The room was sealed, and it didn't have garbage hatches. Her Jabberwocky was powerful, but it didn't have any weapons that could vaporize the wreckage. What could she do? Pick them up and throw them all into a corner?

…or throw them at _ROBIN_.

The Jabberwocky bounded over to the nearest broken wheel, the tail slithering out and grabbing onto the shattered crystalline metal, the shadow whirling and hurling it at Robin as he came down at the other end of the room. The actual projectile missed, but the shrapnel from impact didn't, making Robin stumble a bit and grab at his side. The Jabberwocky clambered onto the wall to its right, crawl-running over and trying to lash Robin with the same tail. Robin, this time, dodged by pure luck, his leaping flip coming so close to the Jabberwocky's tail that the wind distortion disrupted his landing, the Titan almost stumbling and falling before he recovered, running backwards. He had to be more careful, he probably wasn't going to get many more close calls like that, if any.

Marissa went for the next broken wheel, only for Robin to slam on the brakes and sprint DIRECTLY at the Jabberwocky, crimson sword appearing in his hand.

Marissa acted fast, seizing up the wheel and moving to slam it down on Robin. The Jabberwocky mech may have been ten times Robin's size, but it wasn't slow, and with the void-cloaking, its movements were obscured even if Robin could tell roughly where it was. Most people would have had their skull caved in. Marissa did not expect that of Robin.

She also had not expected him to whip out his grapple in mid-dodge, fire it off, and wrap it around the Jabberwocky's arm. Alarm flooded through her, and Marissa quickly entered a command to extend one of the laser cannons out again to blast the line.

Robin reacted first, with a speed that did not seem human, even in terms of a trained, battle-forged human, yanking himself in and cleaving through the laser cannon with his sword before he dropped to the ground and ran beneath the Jabberwocky's legs, still holding onto the grapple. Marissa tried to get the robot to grab him, and then lash him with her machine's tail, but the line still tied around her mech's arm gave away its position, Robin dodging both before he ran to the nearest wall and up it, springing off and leaping for the Jabberwocky's back as it tried to recover from the tail lash.

Marissa twisted her command apparatus, and the machine went into a tumbling roll that would have made the original Robin proud, crashing across the room and forcing Robin to release his grip on the grapple lest he get pulled along and potentially into or under the machine's mass. The Jabberwocky completed its acrobatics and spun back up to its feet…

Just in time for the explosive disk to slam into its chest. Damage reports spiked across Marissa's screens, and she quickly began making adjustments. The machine's armor was good, one disc wouldn't do much of anything…

Except disrupt the void-camo.

Robin had to admire Marissa's design aesthetic. She'd managed to create a perfect blend between height and mass, an immaculate fusion of a basketball and football player. The Jabberwocky was a fusion of animal-type design as well; its legs were part frog and part therapod dinosaur, with its forelimbs more in the vein of a orangutan, albeit with massive prehensile fingers that looked more in place like belonging to some sci-fi monster. The creature's neck was also long and prehensile, with metallic horns pointing outward from its head, a few dribbles of black smoke escaping from its tightly locked mouth. Said mouth was the only feature the face had, the rest of it completely blank, the horns likely there to discourage a facial assault. The machine's entire body was covered with overlapping, interlocking metal armor, the sheets expertly crafted to cover every bit of the machine with protection, leaving no gaps at the limbs or neck that could be exploited, allowing the machine to maintain maximum defense and mobility. The armor was almost as black as the void camo, the plates so carefully laid together that only the basic scanners built into Robin's mask could detect them. A few crackles of dark energy arced around its head, the Jabberwocky twisting its neck and looking at Robin with its blank face.

Robin brought his sword back up.  
Marissa extended the laser cannons again, parts of the machine's arms and chest sliding open to arm the weapons.

"NO! I DON'T WANNA DIE!" Robin said, abruptly shrinking back. Marissa's hand froze on the triggers.

"…so why are you trying to kill me now, Marissa? If it's not what you want…why are you being forced to? You know who _else _forced you." Robin said.

"…it's the only way." Marissa said quietly.

"It's not! It wasn't then, and it isn't now!"

"Then why didn't you stop me?"

"…I couldn't. I just…couldn't…" Robin said. He'd gone over the situation in his head ten thousand times. Considered if he could have been faster, less worn out, given Raven a better order, done the battle a different way, and five hundred other possibilities. The end result was always the same. He hadn't been able to stop her because that's the way things had been.

"Neither can I." Marissa said. "If I fail, he'll abandon me like you did-"

"Does that sound like someone who cares?"

"Doesn't matter. It's all I have. You couldn't then…you can't now."

"That's not true."

"Liar." Marissa said, as she got the void-camo operating again, the Jabberwocky transforming again to a shadow silhouette. "This is my choice. Yours is past."

"What's past is present." Robin said, bringing his sword to bear. The explosive disc he'd used was one of a very few he had left. While they'd been talking, Marissa had pulled the grapple off of her machine…and as soon as her cloaking went back on, she destroyed it with a laser cannon blast. Robin suspected that as long as she had the means to kill him impersonally, any argument he tried would just continue to go in a circle, forming a knot Gordian in its entanglement.

Then again, there was an advantage of having three teammates with Alexander in their names when it came to the first thought-of option for dealing with a Gordian knot. The first thing he had to do was determine if the machine had any more weapons…

It did.

Said weapon being a giant electrified wire net, one that was shot out of the Jabberwocky's tail directly at Robin.

"Bugger." was all the Titan managed to get out before the net was on him.

Robin cut it in half with one mighty slash. Marissa's eyes widened again. That net hadn't been made cheap, and Robin had STILL managed to carve through it like it was made out of plastic.

She promptly switched back to the lasers.

"Smart girl." Robin said, and ran for his life.

* * *

A quartet of explosions blasted across the island, the Titans scattering, Cyborg crashed into a cliff face, tons of rock burying him while Savior's form semi-tumbled out of another mass of smoke. Any attempt to recover he could have made was taken off the table when Torment blurred out and seized him by the throat, slamming him up against yet another mass of rock. Savior, in the back of his head, groaned over just how many cliffs, extensions, outcroppings, and seismically disturbed boulders seemed to be on this damn island. It wasn't exactly a patch of sand with a palm tree, but it was still a giant pain.

"It just won't sink it, will it Collins? Just how out-classed you are." Torment said.

The Shimmer surged up, going for Torment's ears. Pain promptly exploded through Savior's body, like he'd stuck his talent in a cigar cutter.

"Oh come on, Collins. Did you really think THAT would be overlooked?" Torment said, smirking at the Titan's futile attempt to puppeteer him.

"How about possible inner ear imbalances?" Savior said, and formed thin blades on each of his hands before he clapped them together on Torment's head, extracting the Shimmer into him the second the blades entered Torment's ears. Whether it disrupted Torment's balance was uncertain, but it hurt, and the Genocide member recoiled with a scream.

A Shimmer-enclosed fist smashed into his face, another line tripping Torment as Savior pounced on him.

"AND! YOU! DON'T! GET! TO! SPEAK! THAT! NAME!" Savior roared, hammering down punches. "AND IF THAT'S NOT CLEAR ENOUGH, I'M GOING TO DRILL IT DIRECTLY INTO YOUR HEAD!"

Sparks flew as the Titan rammed the bore he'd formed directly into Torment's…shoulder, trying to disable one of his arms. The enchanted metal completely resisting the drill made him regret that maybe he should have taken the claim literally and gone for his head.

Torment promptly extended one of his back spines and blasted Savior in the chest with a shot that felt like a wrecking ball, sending him flying back into the rock face Torment had held him against before he went through it.

"Thanks. Had an itch." Torment said, floating back up to his feet.

"Let me get that for you then."

Scalpel's claw slashed down across Torment's back. Morgue's blast hit the same spot half a second later. The combined blow did little but get Torment's attention…until he turned around and took three more one-two claw/blast attacks, Scalpel finishing with a kick…

Torment caught his ankle.

"Went to the well too many-"

Beast Boy sprinted out from Scalpel's pant leg as a mouse, jumped off the alien, turned into a crab, and clamped his claw on Torment's nose.

"ARR U FUGGIN' KIDDING MEUH?" Torment yelled, slapping at the crustacean. Beast Boy let go after one glancing blow.

Scalpel had taken the time to set his stance, and he buried his foot into Torment's gut.

To his mild alarm, Torment didn't double over or get the breath knocked out of him. He didn't even take a step back.

"Well what do you know?"

Torment raised a hand to deflect Morgue's latest energy shot, and then shredded Scalpel with his nano-tendrils, the alien's blood dripping onto his form and sliding off before hissing on the ground as Torment knocked him away.

"All those situps actually paid off."

Gauntlet punched Torment in the face. The notable part was that he used his own fist. Torment smirked and returned the blow tenfold.

Gauntlet staggered back a few steps. Torment's eyes narrowed. He hadn't hit any shield. He should have knocked the Titan's block off without any shield…

And why did Gauntlet now look like he could be starring in _Sin City_?

"…huh. Skintight shield." Torment said.

"Don't use it often."

"Hmmmm." Torment said, and extended all his back spires and blew up Gauntlet in a massive blast. "I can see why."

Gauntlet promptly flew out of the smoke, having been knocked neither down or out, and slammed his fist into Torment's face again.

"Requires a lot of concentration!" Gauntlet yelled, punching Torment repeatedly. "Shield's solid! Have to will it to move precisely with my body, else I can't move! It's a giant pain in the ass! WHICH SAYS A LITTLE SOMETHING ABOUT YOU AND YOUR BOSS!"

Gauntlet smashed Torment with an upward axe-handle blow. The Genocide member staggered back, and then felt at the corner of his mouth, a faint trace of blood there.

"You seem upset." Torment commented.

"Just a bit! I'm surprised you didn't notice until now!" Gauntlet yelled, doing a flying kick.

Torment blurred away, re-appearing as his left arm warped apart, forming into a cylindrical tube while dark arcs of energy pulled rock from the ground and transformed it into a length of metal.

"Oh, I did." Torment said, and fired the rail cannon at Gauntlet.

"Hey, you stole that from _Crisis Point_!" Gauntlet yelled. Well, he would have, if the magnetically-hurled metal spear hadn't slammed into his chest and sent him tumbling backwards like a rag doll.

"And I figured…may as well really give you a reason to be-ARGGHHHHH!" Torment yelled as he found himself in the center of a slashing mass of diamond blades.

"Sorry asshole! This isn't a horror movie! The same trick DOES work twice!" Terra yelled.

"WHAT?" Torment yelled, trying to knock away the dangerous weapons.

"You ever notice how people never kill the monster in a horror series the same way twice? It must cause something really, REALLY bad to happen because NO ONE EVER TRIES I-!"

Torment seized Terra with his stasis beam and hurled her into the horizon, firing a spray of micro-missiles after her that consumed her body in an explosion.

"Thank you for explaining the joke."

"Pick on someone your own size!" Gauntlet yelled, returning and punching at Torment again.

"I believe I am taller than all of you. Why aren't you hacking up pieces of your lungs?" Torment asked, looking annoyed as he slashed his hand at Gauntlet, following it with a spinning kick when Gauntlet dodged away.

"Because I always eat my vegetables!" Gauntlet said, smacking the villain's leg down and firing more punches into Torment's face. Growling, Torment's rail cannon rapidly switched back to his gravity blaster, only for Gauntlet to keep knocking it away while he threw punches…

Until the same gravity ray fired out of Torment's chest and drove Gauntlet to his knees.

"Then I'll make you one." Torment said, and clubbed Gauntlet over the head with his ray-arm as hard as he could. Gauntlet was knocked forward, seemingly falling onto his face…before he snapped himself back up, a trickle of blood running down his forehead.

"Bravo. Bravo. That WAS you gauging the level of force you'd need to use on me, right? Because if you were actually TRYING, well, wouldn't want to be in your shoes." Gauntlet echoed.

"…Touché." Torment said, and manifested his rail cannon again before aiming it at point-blank range. "I will compensate."

Savior drove the diamond knife as deeply as he could into the upper left spire on Torment's back, wrenching the crystal back and forth and trying to carve through the metal, even as Gauntlet got up and made himself scarce. Snarling in pain, Torment blurred forward and then back, his thrusting kick hitting the Titan like a gunshot, the Shimmer tearing into the rock as it tried to stop himself. With another snarling growl, Torment reached behind himself and yanked the diamond out.

"So what precisely were you trying to accomplish there? Indulge your newly developed masochistic tendencies?" Torment said.

"You ever hear of a _byu-gurr_?" Savior said.

"A what?"

"Alien animal very similar to a turtle. Has a shell of dermal bone that's denser and stronger than promethium."

"What the hell are you-"

Beast Boy, having turned into an ant to crawl into the wound Savior had made with the diamond dagger, promptly held his breath and turned into a _byu-gurr_, hoping he hadn't just condemned himself to a crushing death.

He hadn't. Torment bellowed in pain as Beast Boy's expanding form broke the spire right off his back. Stunned, Beast Boy's gray and yellow body, the _byu-gurr _about the size of a housecat, fell towards the ground, the breaking process having stunned the changeling instead of killing him. A Shimmer line grabbed him up and pulled him away, along with the broken spire, Savior putting his teammate down even as he leapt up, drawing the spire to him.

He drove it directly into Torment's chest.

Torment reacted…in the exact same way he had when Scalpel had kicked him in the torso. That is to say, he didn't.

"…let me guess." Torment growled. "You thought the only thing that could hurt me is a piece of my own armor."

"…did that hurt?" Savior asked.

"A little."

"Heh." Savior said, and then Torment seized him, smashed him into the ground, and threw him into Beast Boy as he returned to human form.

"Now tell me, Cyborg who does not have a mystical shield and is a lot slower and bulkier than that blonde-haired shit, how are YOU going to handle being railroaded?" Torment said, reforming his rail cannon as he turned around and aimed at the approaching Titan, having long heard and sensed him coming.

Cyborg promptly fired off his own cannon, shooting not concussive-sonic force, but waves of debilitating ultrasonic-audio waves. Torment had demonstrated some vulnerability to inner-ear disruption thanks to Noel's head-strike, but he'd recovered and had taken his body and powers for granted in coming up with a defense.

Which it had.

For being directly struck in the ear canal.

An aural blast was a considerably different beast, and Torment quickly lost all sense of where the ground and the sky was, yelling as he staggered around.

"About as terrible as you probably feel right about now."

"FUCK YOU!" Torment roared, aiming and firing in the direction of Cyborg's voice. Even with his disorientation, the rail cannon's terrifyingly fast projectile nearly tore Cyborg's right arm off at the shoulder, his jets the only reason he managed to dodge. Torment snarled in rage and kept firing, the island transforming into his ammo, even as Cyborg pushed his rockets as hard as he could. Electromagnetic propulsion was not the same as turning on a TV when it came to the kind of current needed to do it, so in a way, Torment firing multiple shots was a good thing: he'd demonstrated he could suffer from overheating before, and that level of electricity generated intense heat. It would cease being a good thing if even one of them hit Cyborg, though. Even with his armor and shields, machines just did not hold up well to getting shot with metal spikes being hurled at three times the speed of sound.

Of course, there was another benefit to that. Something moving at three times the speed of sound meant sonic booms. Cyborg wasn't bothered by them: when your primary weapon was based on sound, you very quickly learned all the ins and outs of it (or went deaf) and how best to protect yourself. Torment did not. And Cyborg had just shot his ears full of ultrasonics. The end result was Torment stopping after four more shots and holding his head, trying to get his bearings. It was an absolute beautiful time to cut loose.

He didn't even have to order it. He just braced himself and unleashed both sonic cannons and a spray of missiles. Starfire flew in from one side and added a beach ball-sized Starbolt, Morgue came in from another angle with _Dyson's Fear_, and once the explosions were done, Terra dropped a building sized rock onto the smoke cloud.

Starfire flew past Cyborg, looking into his eyes as she did. Cyborg weighed the option of throwing more firepower into the dust cloud or dialing it back down, and went with the latter before signaling it. Starfire nodded and flew back into the overcast sky, while Savior dropped down and hid behind some nearby rocks.

When the smoke cleared, Torment was still standing, and still relatively unmarked…but Cyborg could tell from his body language that he hadn't ignored that barrage like the last one.

"What's the prognosis?" Gauntlet said, striding up next to Cyborg.

"We're getting somewhere."

"How's everyone else doing?"

"Fair to good. You?"

"Getting into the enjoying violence groove. I'd be concerned, except I'm too busy enjoying the violence. More violence now?"

"Careful Gauntlet." Cyborg said.

"I'm all right."

"Let me be…you actually _are_." Cyborg said, having done a quick scan. Gauntlet HAD soaked both getting shot by the rail cannon and getting bashed over the head with it. "How did you do that?"

"Burning the candle at both ends, more or less. Also, I don't suppose you have an aspirin? This focus is really starting to hurt."

"You know…you should just quit right now." Torment said. "I'm…really not amused any more."

"Oh I'm sorry. I was unaware that we were acting out some performance art piece instead of trying to kill each other." Scalpel said.

"Alien…do you even realize…"

"Can we just not have this talk? Again? Because something tells me you'd be bad at it." Beast Boy said, stalking around as a mountain lion. Torment actually laughed at that, and then arcs of crimson and black energy coursed over him, an updraft of power starting to carry tiny pieces of rock into the air around him.

"I cannot be…stopped…by the likes of you…I am not the one…lying to themselves about the situation…I…"

Terra flicked her thumb, and one of the pebbles abruptly flew into Torment and smacked into his right eye before being disintegrated.

"OW!"

"You should have invested in shades." Terra quipped.

"…heh…heh heh. Titans…" Torment said, his arm beginning to shift into another gun. "What a great ti-"

The explosion was so loud that Cyborg thought for a second that Torment had somehow managed to convert his back into the rail cannon and fire it at one of the Titans. He quickly realized that was not the case. The sound wasn't immediate, but distant…

"INCOMING!" Morgue yelled.

The black mass of smoke and fire smashed down a hundred feet away and tore across the battlefield. Cyborg jetted backwards, noting that even Torment took to the air to recoil away from the seething darkness. Cyborg's electronic eye abruptly scrambled and began crackling with fuzz. The cloud was overloaded with violent magic…

Raven erupted out from it, her arms held out in front of her. Whirling discs of black energy glanced off her shield, Raven flying backwards and out of the clawed shadow hands that came out after the discs. The Titans all stared at this sudden arrival, even as the black smoke contorted back into the Lord's body, fire literally burning in his eyes.

"Right then bitch…I think I'm getting your range…and your shield consistency…" The Lord said, not even comprehending he wasn't fighting inside his personal fortress any more. The Titans didn't have to be Raven to feel the sheer vitriol erupting off the Lord in waves. "And I'm fairly sure I have your reacti-"

The Lord's grasping shadow hand, expanding to the size of a car and whose palm was edged with jagged spikes, nearly moved as fast as one of Torment's rail cannon shots. In hideous contrast, despite breaking the sound barrier, it was dead silent. Dark magic obeyed no laws but its own…

Raven fired her own bolt of shadow directly into it, tearing it in half and traveling down its length before it impaled in the Lord. The last thing he'd been saying was 'reaction time', and he hadn't.

"YOU-!"

Raven yanked the Lord to her and both spun and backhanded him so hard the pressure wave knocked the nearest Titans back a step. The Lord crashed down into the ground, the ground not so much cratering from the impact as burning away. Floating back up with a growl, the Lord clapped his hands together and then held them level as he began pouring energy between them.

"STAR, CATAPULT!" Cyborg yelled. At the sound of his voice, the Lord's eyes widened a bit, flicking to the Titan combat leader, realizing where he was.

"Oh."

Torment wasn't sure what had happened. Had his boss come to join the fight? And if he did, what kind of a plan was he doing where he got slapped around by a Titan? Maybe he should-

Starfire crashed into Torment, throwing every bit of strength she had into the move as she shoved the Genocide member over the horizon.

"CUT THE HEAD OFF!" Cyborg yelled.

"Oh, like it would be that easy." The Lord said, and then snapped up a hand to grab the projectile that had been fired at him out of the air. "Anything bu-"

Morgue's solar grenade exploded, and the Lord screamed as the blinding golden energy ripped his body to shreds.

"…what?" Morgue said, looking at Savior's shocked face as she moved to reload the grenade launcher.

"…_HOLY **SHIT!**" Ryce said with a similar expression._

"We're facing the Lord! This is not a time to go halves!" Sophie was saying.

"Where did you get a grenade launcher?" Savior said.

"Ebay!…Ebay Gotham!"

"So the black market."

"Don't judge me!"

"I meant where the hell did you pull that from?"

"I have a lot of cape."

"_**AND NOT ENOUGH TEETH."**_ The Lord thundered as he reformed. "Sorry, Titan, but after dealing with all the solar-infused magical bullshit your blackbird threw at me, I'm afraid you'll have to TRY HARDER."

Cyborg immediately blasted the Lord through two rock faces with his Canis Majoris solar cannon.

"_**SON OF A FUCKING BITCCCCHHHHH!"**_

"_Yes!" Ryce cheered._

"What the hell is going on Raven?" Savior said, as he bounded over to her side. "He's not stupid enough to just jump into the middle of another fight!…Is he?" Savior said. He did not hear Ryce's second 'yes', for obvious reasons.

"Stupid AND mad enough. Like waving a red cape at a bull." Raven said.

"Well I'm not gonna…"

Machine gun bullets filled the air…but they did not come from Torment. Instead, three Flutter-Byes had emerged, shooting at the pair, and even as Savior formed a shield a Haber-Dasher and Mock Tank sprinted and rolled up, Raven knocking away the former with a blast of her own power.

"WHAT? Is it twenty minutes ago again?" Savior said.

"Savior, ignore the pests! GET THE LORD!" Cyborg ordered.

"No! Raven, go help! I'll take care of this!" Savior said, springing over and kicking the Mock Tank in half with a Shimmer blade. A moment later, the Lord burst out from the mass of rock he'd been buried under, firing at Cyborg as he tried to both get out of the way and recharge his solar beam

"You heard the man. GET HIM! TITANS, GO!" Beast Boy yelled, charging in as a lion.

"Hello, actual target of my rage!" Gauntlet said, forming a spear.

"Oh isn't this cute. Are we getting flashbacks to a rout inside a clock tower? I assure you that-ARGHHHH!" The Lord yelled, as he blocked Beast Boy's clawed swipe with his arm and ended up feeling it like he was a normal man, well, blocking a lion swiping him with his bare arm. "Rarghhhwhatthe…FANG SHARDS…"

"_YES!"_

Gauntlet promptly cleaved half of the Lord's head off, black smoke and poisonous mist erupting from the wound.

"That's not how you use a spear!"

"Please file a complaint, we'll answer it never." Raven said, and when the Lord aimed his hand at her she promptly blew it off.

"…so you condemn me, yet you surround me like a-"

"Just shut up and die!" Morgue called, before she blasted the Lord with another solar grenade. The Lord exploded into a mass of flying…things, a disgusting mix of insect and mythological traits, and reformed nearby. Terra promptly dropped another building-sized rock on his head, and then hammered it up and down until she broke the dense stone in half.

"Save some for me." Savior muttered, slicing a Marchare in half and then ripping up his own chunk of rock and bashing a Haber-Dasher with it. Another Mock Tank rolled up…and promptly exploded as Scalpel impaled his glaive into it.

"Look after that!" The alien said, leaping onward while drawing his scimitars.

"Hooray. Now all I need is some carrots. Or a quiet voice. DON'T HAVE EITHER, WILL MAKE DO!" Savior yelled, grabbing up the glaive and carving another Haber-Dasher into pieces. These were the last dregs of the mechanical army, he could handle it…

A Mock Tank promptly blasted him in the side, knocking him down.

"FUCCKKK YOUUUUUUU!"

Shimmer lines lashed out and seized the discarded back-spire Noel had ripped from Torment, impaling the Mock-Tank with it, and then a second, and then a third before the Titan impaled the metal into the ground, explosions blasting shrapnel from the destroyed robots that flew past him.

"Ball four! Take your base!…that made no sense at all!" Savior said, and whirled around to use the glaive to knock a Marchare's head clear off. "SOMEWHAT MORE APPROPRIATE NOW!"

Rasping air into his lungs (which seemed like a good sign for the Titans, considering he didn't need to breathe), the Lord part-walked, part-stumbled, and part-dragged himself from within Terra's bludgeoning rock. He found six pair of eyes glaring at him in various degrees of absolute hatred.

"…heh…hah hah-idiots." The Lord said, throwing up a hand. Every Titan except Raven suddenly felt a cold, artificial calmness fall over their enmity, and dark arcs of power surged up from cracks in the ground and into the Lord. He'd just fed on their negative emotions. "IN THESE MATTERS, STILL CHILDREN."

Morgue fired another solar grenade. The Lord grabbed it in a blur and hurled it away.

Raven opened a portal and it flew right back into the Lord, attaching to his forehead.

"Oh you MUST be joking."

The grenade exploded, vaporizing the Lord's entire top half. The ground of _La Voix _cracked open further, seething mist flowing up and joining with what was left of the Lord as he reformed.

Gauntlet promptly ran up and kicked him in the balls.

"Sorry! That was childish! Here's an adult blow!" Gauntlet said, and punched the Lord in the face so hard the rock behind him shattered from the force before the Lord flew through it. He spun as he recovered, drawing a barbed whip from within his cloaks.

"I'll make you weep blood!"

Raven flew down, and the Lord lashed out. Teleporting away, the whip tore into the ground, the mark both hissing and burning.

"Shadow weapons that leave scary aftereffects and violent threats. More like I bloody weep at your lack of evolution." Cyborg said, flying over and firing down with the Canis Majoris. This time, the Lord dodged.

"The pinnacle has no need to evolve!"

Raven proceeded to grab the Lord and face-plant him into the ground. The Lord sprang up for Terra to unleash every crystalline gem she had on the Lord. Unlike Torment, where she had been holding back as per her training, Terra just impaled the shadow god from every single angle she could muster. The Lord staggered back a step, and then dispersed the gem dagger-projectiles with an eruption of dark power.

"I'm sorry child, but your own Fang shards don't help as much if they're in your wrists up there and I'm down here." The Lord said, and lashed his whip at Terra. She flew backwards…as the Lord dropped his whip and clapped his hands. Portals opened up on either side of Terra, and giant clawed hands moved to crush her in turn.

Terra thrust her rock platform up and then, with precise control, kicked off it. The hands smashed together on open air, Raven blasting them away immediately, and with a flip, Terra landed back on the same platform.

"I just did that so you wouldn't pay attention to the fat girl aiming the giant cannon at you."

"OH NO YOU DON'T!" The Lord snarled, turning around and aiming at Morgue. She waved and then turned into a cloud of bats. "Oh for the love of…"

Cyborg blasted the Lord from the sky a second later, his form tearing apart under the intense solar energies.

"…something's wrong." Savior said, pulling the head off a Marchare. The Titan would have expected this impotent flailing from someone like Torment, or maybe one of Gauntlet's less serious enemies if they got their hands on some kind of immense power. Not the Lord, not like this. It could not be this simple. It was NEVER this simple. Well, the distant explosions that could barely be heard over the Lord battle indicated that it wasn't, but still…

"What is your master planning…" Savior said, smashing a Snark with Scalpel's glaive before turning to look at Etemenanki. It didn't seem to be doing anything out of its ordinary. Maybe the sky then? Could he hide something among the clouds?

Or maybe his plan was to just deafen the Titans, as the Lord suddenly screamed before flying up into the sky. From the way it staggered him, Savior had no idea if the cry had been an attack or if the Lord was now so enraged his powers were bleeding into his voice.

"_**INSECTS…" **_The Lord raged. _**"I'LL SCOUR YOU RIGHT OFF THIS FACE OF EXISTENCE, BODY AND SOUL."**_

Raven felt the Lord's power spike. For one brief moment, she considered trying to contain it.

It seemed she was too slow.

The lethal filaments exploded from within the Lord, dozens, hundreds, maybe thousands of black lines. With barbed, spiked, bladed, and a dozen other murderous skins, they came for the Titans, the myriad strands filling the sky above and ripping into every part of the ground below. An instant labyrinth of death, a web of demise, the lines coiling and thrusting and phasing through each other to seek flesh and blood. Even Savior, who was nearly five hundred feet away, found himself having to dodge the deadly strands, the black lines even impaling and tearing through most of the few remaining robots Savior had dedicated himself to fight.

"_**YOU SEEK TO FIGHT A GOD? I WILL SCAR MYSELF ON YOUR VERY DNA!"**_

The tendrils withdrew with beyond-possible speed, and the Lord streaked down and slammed into the ground. The whole island seemed to roar in turn, and from the ground erupted an equal number of blades, of all sizes and designs, ripping the dense stone of La Voix to powder. Savior cursed and went into a frantic dodge as the earth did its best to impale him, the swords finishing whatever robots the tendrils had missed.

But, almost as soon as the blades had emerged, they were gone, falling to dust themselves and blowing away. The Lord knelt where he'd driven himself, a few faint arcs of darkness crackling on his shoulders and through his hair as he looked up.

"No…"

"_**YES!" **Ryce cheered again._

Raven floated back down, letting go of Cyborg with her own power. He'd been the only one she'd had to assist in her choice of efforts. He was fairly bulky, after all, even moreso with his added equipment.

But the rest of her team had carried themselves magnificently, and avoided both of the Lord's destructive attacks on their lonesome. It was why she hadn't chosen to contain it. She didn't have to.

"You can't…CHILDREN. You can't…just endure…armies and beasts and…HOW…" The Lord said, genuine disbelief in his tone.

"Not everyone folds under the first hint of pressure." Gauntlet said.

"What would YOU know…about pressure?" The Lord said, trying to gather himself.

"Enough to know a quitter when I see it."

"YOU-!"

Cyborg's solar cannon exploded where the Lord had been, the shadow god managing to leap out of the way…into Savior's dual-Shimmer lash, the impact throwing him backwards into Raven's grip.

"It doesn't really matter if you're a quitter or not. Today's the day you submit." Raven said. "Either to us, or to oblivion. You wanted me to talk, mockery? Then listen."

The Lord manifested a spike on his hand and punched at the side of Raven's head. His hand disappeared into another portal, said portal closing off and taking the Lord's hand with it, Raven's eyes going as black as the Lord's.

"This story will not end the way you thought it would."

Raven blasted the Lord backwards, directly into Scalpel as he leapt up and brought his warhammer to bear, smashing the Lord into the ground. The Lord got up, only for Morgue to return with _Dyson's Fear_, blasting the Lord across _La Voix _again. Gauntlet stopped his travel by smashing him into the ground. When the Lord again got up, Scalpel leapt in again, this time with his retrieved-from-Savior glaive, and slashed through him. Morgue immediately blasted him with the cannon again, throwing the Lord off his feet. When he got back up, a scorpion stinger the size of an anaconda stabbed into his neck, and when the Lord turned to blast Beast Boy in his awkward giant arachnid form, Cyborg's sonic cannon promptly blew off the aiming arm. Beast Boy immediately rammed the stinger into the Lord's forehead, the shadow god staggering back before falling to one knee again, dark mist seeping from his body.

"You…" The Lord whispered.

"Your levels of power have been dropping steadily since you left your fortress. You can't beat us." Raven said, and unleashed another pair of rending bird claws.

The Lord leapt backwards.

"_**I DON'T HAVE TO."**_

The Lord held up a hand, several glowing sigils erupting on the air above it.

"Such a clever girl, advancing so far! Not far enough! Or rather, too close to see it. Enough of this performance. Time to drop the curtain, COLLINS!"

Raven's eyes went wide, even as she felt like someone had jammed a dagger into her heart. No. It was impossible. He couldn't! HE COULDN'T!

The Lord snapped out his hand, and the ground erupted around Noel.

"Come, sleeper. AWAKEN."

"…_no."_

Raven whirled around and aimed her hands at her boyfriend. No. It was impossible. There was no way he could have buried anything like this in Noel. Not after her preparations. Not after her agonies. Not after all the tortured self-reflection and, in turn, inspection she'd made of him.

Yet…the Lord's darkness was washing over him, even as he flailed and fought…

…she was right.

It WAS impossible. This wasn't corruption or mind-warping magic, or some kind of buried trigger she had somehow missed despite all her efforts. It was…

Smoke and mirrors. The very first rule of magic, of any kind. MISDIRECTION.

"NO!" Raven yelled, turning back and blasting at the Lord. The Lord veered away, lancing down towards the ground. Raven was about to fire again when Terra's scream struck her.

"_**STOP!"** Ryce snarled at the empty air._

It wasn't just audible, the geokinetic's shriek. Not for Raven. It struck her in her physical and metaphorical heart as well. In that noise was all the rage, all the vindictiveness, all the pain and betrayal and black hate that Tara Markov had tried to control, tried to direct towards the 'proper' targets, tried to keep out of the hands of her primal instincts. All the darkness she'd felt towards Noel and been unable to work through, for what he'd done to her in the grip of the Lord's poison and manipulation. It was understandable, really. Noel had been hard on Tara. He'd made her miserable more than a few times, and there weren't enough times where Robin had told him he was overstepping his bounds to balance it. He'd demanded so much of her, and then, when the chips were down, failed worse than she ever had.

Yet…he hadn't. Both in that rotting hotel and in the times beforehand. Raven knew her love made mistakes, did things for the wrong reasons, and sometimes toed the abuse of power line. When he did, Robin dragged him back by his ear, and if Robin didn't, she did. The rest was simply the cruelty of the drill sergeant, the carefully directed mental abuse that was meant to prompt rebuilding instead of reprisal. Terra had immense power, hell, when she joined she might have been the strongest of the Titans, and even today she only barely lagged behind. Between that, a vulnerable psyche, and what observation of events in this world and others had demonstrated, training that strayed into such a harsh level was approved as necessary, in proper doses. By his nature, Noel was one of the better ones at such unpleasant tasks. He'd never admit it, but he was his father's son.

The rest was the Lord. All the Lord. Raven had not tried to force that fact on Terra. It was not her place. Raven suspected that, in her rational mind, Tara knew that just as well as Raven. Raven also knew, all too well, the way emotions could explode and carry one along, leaving all sense behind, leaving only its needs and wants, consequences be damned. She'd tried to compensate. She'd actually warned the Titans that the Lord could pull something like this, and that with the danger of the upcoming battle, they couldn't leave anyone behind for psychological reasons.

The Lord had used it. In all the chaos, that fact had fallen by the Titans' mental waysides. With a little waving of hands, he'd slipped around their memories and broken the dam in Terra.

And before Raven could stem the tide, Terra promptly hammered a piece of rock into Savior's face as hard as she could. Had the Shimmer and Cyborg's shield not blunted most of the impact, she probably would have taken Noel's head right off.

"TERRA, NO!" Gauntlet yelled, briefly taking his eyes off the Lord. In that moment, the Lord took off running, and with a muffled curse Gauntlet turned around and tried to grab him. The Lord blurred away again, and within a second was out of Gauntlet's range.

Raven couldn't help it. She froze. She knew she had to pursue the Lord. She also knew that Terra was completely lost in her rage, and Noel wasn't the only one at risk there. The island of _La Voix _was still deeply infected with the Lord's power. Terra had adapted admirably, the gift of all those brutal hours of training, but in her current state, it was far more likely she'd overstep her boundaries and cause the Lord's poison in her earth to give her a stroke, or worse.

_Azarath…no…we were so CLOSE…_

Morgue was rapidly waving her gun back and forth between Noel and the retreating Lord. She was a brilliant woman, but her war experience was still forming, and she'd ended up doing the 'self-defense' option. Scalpel DID have immense war experience, but between his close range specialty and the fact that he'd gotten into some really bad situations running off by himself, he'd also opted for the defense option and leapt over to Morgue. Beast Boy, thank god, was running to Terra…

Who was still trying to kill Noel, her out of control anger crashing against Raven like an avalanche.

"KILL YOU! FUCKING BASTARD! BASTARD!" Terra yelled, hurling more rocks, forcing Noel behind another Shimmer shield.

"TERRA, IT'S A TRICK!" Gauntlet yelled. Cyborg, meanwhile, took one last shot at the Lord (which missed) before he turned and jetted over to the mess. Beast Boy finally reached Terra, transforming back into human form and grabbing her arms, Scalpel having started forward to break up the fight himself.

"NO! NO NO NO, GET HIM!" Terra shrieked.

"Terra, don't listen! It was a lie, he…!" Raven started, before the blonde Titans screamed again and hurled a car-sized rock at Noel with her mind.

Savior knocked it aside, somehow beating both Cyborg and Raven to the punch. The problem was that Terra had just blasted him upside the head with a rock. It would have thrown anyone's aim off.

Savior, however, was the nexus of the Lord's greatest cruelty of the Titans, a cruelty awash in shades of gray. So when the rock ended up nearly hitting Morgue and Scalpel, Cyborg reacted and popped open part of his arm before pressing a button.

"Huh-AHHHHHHHHHH!" Savior screamed, as electricity suddenly seized him and caused him to nearly fall flat on his face.

"Cyborg! What are you doing?" Raven yelled.

"I'm disabling him!"

"WHY?"

Cyborg blinked.

"VICTOR! IT WAS A DAMN FEINT! HE RAN FOR IT!" Gauntlet yelled, actually furious: for half a second, Raven thought he was going to crush the part of Cyborg's arm he'd used to zap Noel…

…Zap Noel?

"…You put attenuating tech in his personal shield." Raven said, looking at Cyborg with blank eyes. Cyborg grimaced, and then shut the process off, freeing Savior from the paralyzing (and painful) shock.

"…I had to be sure."

"Raven, we can't debate this! GO!" Morgue yelled.

"Yeah! Go get the bastard!" Gauntlet said.

"…Cyborg, resume previous orders." Raven said, her voice cold.

"Raven…" Cyborg said, regret briefly crossing his face.

"I know." Raven said, and then teleported away.

"…DAMN IT! WE HAD HIM!" Gauntlet yelled, kicking at a nearby rock. Beast Boy had finally calmed Terra down some, though her eyes were still glowing gold.

"Terra! The Lord lied. Don't waste your energy." Scalpel said. Savior slowly got up, feeling at his forehead where Terra had struck him, blood beginning to stain his white hair.

"Noel…" Cyborg said.

"You did what you had to." Savior said. Cyborg didn't have to be Raven to know Savior was putting a brave face on.

"Isn't _that _the old hero tombstone marker."

Starfire was dumped onto the ground a second after Torment had finished speaking.

"STAR!" Gauntlet yelled, running over. Starfire could only stare dully from a blood-streaked face, her outfit as battered as her body.

"She knew what she was giving up. Fighting me by herself. So you could try and kill the master." Torment said, looking considerably better than his opponent, his golden-blonde hair drifting around his shoulders. "She knew this was going to happen. Didn't stay her hand at all. Admirable…I guess? I just don't get it, really. Then again…she could never have comprehended it's not the master that will ultimately kill you. It's your own selves."

The Titans only glared back. Torment smirked briefly, floating up in the air, crimson and gold energies flowing around his body.

"See…I know what _I _am. You guys can't figure it out at all. If you could, well…you wouldn't be so quick to turn on each other, would you? Titans together? Please. It's in your nature to fall apart. Even if you don't want to, you'll do it anyway. God, no wonder the world is a shithole."

"Shut up." Cyborg said, servos whining as he clenched his fist.

"Why?" Torment said. "Am I wrong?"

"…_OREWA SHIN DERU."_ Gauntlet snarled.

"Pardon? Let me access my universal translator…"

The sonic blast, Gauntlet punch, and plasma cannon blast from Morgue nearly came as one. Torment still blurred out of the way.

"Never mind then! I believe I have more pieces to take to pieces!" Torment said, and transformed his arms into gatling cannons and opened fire.

* * *

Silkie…ran. Scuttled frantically from the kitchen as wooden chips from the cabinet rained down on him. Behind him, a fury of wings and claws raged, a tail snapping out and ruining another cabinet.

Through the snarling growls, the most decipherable English formed the words,

"Stupid…empty-headed! Blond! BITCH," followed by words that were unimportant outside of their vulgarity. The worm would not be returning to the cook's company any time soon.

* * *

The Lord could not take much satisfaction for how thoroughly he'd fouled things up for the Titans. They'd fouled things up far more for him.

Part of him didn't want to believe how far Raven had advanced. The other part was utterly enraged. She had talent, and potential, but she was also a so-called superhero. Her time and energy were divided by her idiotic calling, not to mention all the 'normal' things she did with her companions to try and convince herself she wasn't a human/demon hybrid who was one bad day away from becoming daddy's little girl again. The Lord not only had considerably more time, he had a lot more options on how to spend it. He could step into separate dimensions where seconds lasted minutes, read whole books between the ticks of a clock, and unlike Raven, he actually did in-depth studies of forbidden knowledge instead of just skimming it. That wasn't even accounting for the godly abilities he'd developed thanks to the Titans years ago, abilities he'd worked on refining after each of his setbacks.

He'd know what she was capable of, he'd KNOWN. How in all of the hells had she gotten so far past his analysis? He would have sworn she'd sold her damn soul, except he knew it was still there. He'd tried to obliterate it and failed.

The Titans were, if anything, worse. Raven at least was a semi-equal. All they had in terms of chances against him was whatever magical scraps and old-hat solar weapons they could throw together. The shards of the Fang, he'd predicted them as a strong possibility, but not to this degree of effectiveness. What the hell, he'd _broken _the damn sword! How could PIECES of it suddenly hurt so much? And solar power, that was a well-know weakness. He thought he'd been ready to handle it…well, until Raven had tossed all his expectations out the window.

Accursed demon whorespawn. She thought she was his superior? She thought that she had some kind of righteous fury that would carry her to victory? All the Lord had done was show her, and her allies, the bitter truth. They should not have pulled together like this. He'd sown the seeds of betrayal and mistrust, exposed the idiotic hypocrisies of their calling, held them up to the light and shown them what happened when they got put under REAL pressure. A challenge? Yes, he'd expected that. But not to be dominated. Not to be…

Helpless.

Never helpless. Never.

Even the fact that Starfire might have been down for the count and that two of the Titans, including their makeshift leader, had swallowed his hook wasn't good enough for him. If they'd pulled together like this, they could do it again. With Raven, curse her damn existence, having infused limiting seals on the Lord that he couldn't break (well, he could, but not without expending so much power that he might _REALLY_ be helpless), on top of all the other ways she'd come ahead of his plans, the Lord had fallen back to a simple backup plan. Get back to his room and access the Foreverwhere. And so he ran, sprinting across the length of _La Voix _back towards Etemenanki, the crackling, tangled spires of his creation looming over him.

He had expected Raven to catch up to him before he made it all the way back to the ritual chamber. He had also expected her to attack by trying to blast him, or maybe throw something at him.

He had not expected her to phase into existence right in front of him and do a variant of an aikido takedown when he ran into her.

Well, the only real link to aikido was the fact she used his own momentum against him. Instead of throwing him to the ground, she just threw him outright, in an upward arc towards his tower. The Lord figured she was trying to toss him over it and pin him down on the other side, perhaps counting on his rattled state.

The Lord had not come so far by excessively stumbling, though, and he retaliated the second he was in the air, firing off a clutching black line that grabbed onto Raven and yanked her after him. Raven yelled in rage and fired a blast, which the Lord dodged by swinging her away. Raven followed it with her own grip-strike, a taloned hand seizing the Lord by the leg and trying to both tear the limb off and break Raven free.

The Lord immediately reminded Raven that, while she had rendered him unable to teleport himself or fly, he was still not a human being and not bound by their laws. A good example being able to abruptly propel himself 'forward' as the two fell, the shadow god crashing into the Titan as they struck Etemenanki and crashed through its floors, finally breaking apart three levels down.

Raven had sensed the bad environment coming and enclosed herself in darkness before the pair had broken through the last floor. This room was filled with toxic, virulent mist, a miasma byproduct of the tower weapon it seemed. It would have eaten away most of her companions in seconds, but to her, it was a simple black magic discharge easily defended against.

The Lord, of course, was the Lord, and didn't even take notice of the poisonous air. Raven knew why. She could sense the deeper poison within him. He hated the Titans, all of them, but she'd managed to stoke his rancor for her to a new intensity. She would have been more satisfied, if that didn't make him more dangerous.

She was ready, though. She would not let what her teammates had done be wasted.

"Enjoyed that, did you?" The Lord said. Apparently, he'd picked up on her dark glee, even with the miniscule deal she'd felt. "I'm sure…"

The Lord raised his hands, and four inch talons erupted from his fingers.

"After all, every condemned is entitled to a last meal."

"Eat up, then." Raven said. The Lord snarled and leapt at her, clawing for her mocking eyes.

* * *

The thunderous vibrations began to echo through Etemenanki again, the impacts seeming to coincide with Marissa's heartbeat. Thump-BOOM. Thump-BOOM.

Marissa tried to keep her focus, but her fear reverberated in every action she took. The ragged heat in her lungs every time she took a breath, the sour taste in the back of her mouth, the trickles of sweat that ran down her face and beaded up on her hands beneath her gloves. She'd failed. She'd sent out the last of her robots to aid the Lord, and they'd accomplished nothing. Worse, he'd smashed some of them himself, like they were more obstacles in his way. She'd thought she could divide her attention, had to, with the way Torment had been abruptly taken out of the fight, but the end result was the same. Robin was still alive. She'd tried to fight him at the same time she'd directed the last of her army, she'd even landed two good hits, one a tail lash, and the other where one of her lasers had glanced his leg, but it hadn't hurt him enough to slow him down. The Lord would be so angry…

The fact that the Lord, her supposed perfect master, hadn't killed any of the Titans himself, and that Torment had purposely chosen, for whatever reason, to deliberately go against the Lord's orders and NOT kill Starfire, was lost on the young woman. All she knew was she had been given a task, and her tools hadn't succeeded in it.

She had to finish Robin. She couldn't let the fear cause her to make a mistake. She still held a considerable advantage. None of the Titans were going to show up to provide him with aid. She WOULD kill him, or at the very least, damage him so badly he'd be beyond even Raven's ability to heal. He was standing in the way. Those who stood against history were crushed under it.

Robin was not crushed under the Jabberwocky's hand, doing a dodging backwards flip to avoid it, drawing his body into a ball at the last second to make a smaller target of himself. The downside of having switched to a longer cape abruptly came back to him, as the Jabberwocky missed Robin with its follow-up hand slash, but caught his cape. Yanking him back, Robin immediately released the cloak and went with the momentum, spinning and performing an acrobatic tumble to get back to his feet without injury. The Jabberwocky looked at the cloak for a second, and then tossed it aside, turning back towards Robin.

She couldn't fail. If she failed, the Lord had no place for her. He'd toss her aside, just like he had the first Genocide. Like he'd done with Roger Simms when his magical metagene hadn't taken perfectly. Like he might do with the second Genocide, the trio having proven to be little more than a treadmill the Titans had run briefly on. He'd leave her to the 'tender mercies' of the world, a world Marissa knew had no mercy and was the very antithesis of tender.

Robin was feeling afraid too. Afraid that he didn't have the capabilities to defeat this machine (True, he'd physically beaten powerhouses like Cinderblock in combat, but Cinderblock literally had rocks in his head. Marissa Mori, for all her troubles, did not). Afraid that even if he pulled something out of his bag of tricks, that breaking her avatar would just break Marissa and lead her to do something incredibly stupid like trigger a self-destruct mechanism in the room that would kill both her and himself. Afraid of the quiet, that brief quiet, when the battle between the Lord and Raven had completely vanished from Robin's tangential senses, and Robin's gut told him that it hadn't been the best option, that being that Raven had won. It was back now, the echoes of the rampage, and Robin had no time to get onto his communicator and ask what was going on.

That didn't mean he lacked communication, though. He hoped.

_Raven, how's the situation?_

The Jabberwocky hunched down and breathed fire again, this time directly the flame in a concentrated tube. Robin ran for it, leaping and just missing the sweeping cone of burning chemicals.

Marissa fired another electrified net immediately afterward. Robin was in no position to hack through it this time, and so he threw himself on the ground. The enmeshing shot missed him by no more than a centimeter, its crackling electricity making the hair on the back of Robin's head and neck stand up.

The voice also emitted in the back of his head, faint and somewhat garbled. Robin, however, heard the two most important words clearly.

_Recoverable! Continue!_

"So…what happens when I'm dead, then?" Robin said, turning back to the psychological tactic. "You think he's going to congratulate you for taking who knows how many turns of a stopwatch to stop one normal human? The same way he'll probably pat Genocide on the back for 'doing their best' and 'wearing them down', right? The same way he's probably going 'Wow, these Titans are sure refusing to die in the most beautifully defiant way, it's a work of art', right? You don't hear truth in my words, Marissa? Then hear it in your master's rage." Robin said, and started running as lasers blasted at him. He MUST have been getting to her in some way, if only because she'd stopped exploiting the perception issues the Jabberwocky's void-camo as much as she could. "Do you really hear a future in that? That complete and utter acrimony? Or do you see the REAL truth? That to him, you're only as useful for how long he can use you to eliminate the targets of his rage, and that once those targets are gone, he'll find a reason to make you his new targets? You think I'm a liar? Tell me this, then! Does that noise sound like a well that will ever run dry? That will ever stop seeking breath to drag under and drown? Does that sound like something that crafts a future, or something that consumes _all futures? _INCLUDING YOURS?"

"…he made me better! He never asks for anything! The world would be the one that would drown me!" Marissa said, her mouth dry. She dearly wanted a drink of water.

"Really? He asked for nothing? He wants nothing?" Robin said. "Then why are you so afraid?"

Marissa slowly drew in a breath, exhaling through her nostrils. How could he ever understand? How could the Boy Wonder, the Bat-Scion, the beloved of millions with countless victories to his name, realize that there was no freedom, no chance for her, in HIS world? The Lord's rage was _because _of that world, of its supposed heroes allowing it to continue. Even if he was also terrifying, even if she had to work herself half to death and madness to gain his basic tolerance…at least he gave her a chance.

What did Robin offer?

"BECAUSE YOU WANT TO TAKE IT ALL AWAY!" Marissa yelled, and the Jabberwocky void-camo phased it into existence again as its chest and legs opened. Hand-sized metal spheres rolled out of the machine, the darkness falling back onto its skin as it backed up. Robin narrowed his eyes and tensed up.

Several of the bomblets abruptly bounced high into the air. Robin, for a brief moment, REALLY hoped it was some sort of out of the ordinary weapon and not something that would reduce him to hamburger like flechetes.

He got his wish, as the bombs exploded, releasing purple-colored waves in various directions. Robin dodged as best he could: the energy curves moved slower than the lasers, but there was a lot of them…

Then they began slamming into the walls, ceiling, and floor, and their true purpose was revealed as a series of explosive blasts erupted from every inch of the blast's impact surface. The whole room abruptly filled with explosions, throwing Robin off his feet and battering him with stone and crystal shrapnel. Marissa didn't get a chance to enjoy this, as one of the pulses slammed into and exploded against her window, causing her to recoil with a cry. The glass held, though, and after a quick check of her instruments, Marissa detonated the other bombs. Fire blazed up from the weapons, and then the magical aspect of the weapons kicked in as the pillars of flame began to race around the room, like something out of a video game. Robin would have found the affect more amusing if the Jabberwocky didn't immediately breath fire towards him while he tried to dodge the pillars. The end result was a scorched hand and Robin having to pause for a breather when the flame pillars disappeared.

Then the last explosion-pulse bomb blew, and the energy whipped across the room and caught Robin directly in the chest. The blast hurled him violently into the wall behind him, the Titan leader finally losing his grip on his sword as it clattered to the ground. When he landed it was with none of the grace he'd demonstrated before; instead he collapsed onto his face, not moving.

Marissa stared a moment, before she activated her scanning equipment. There was still a pulse in the Titan.

A moment later, he started getting up. Marissa watched, even as she was vaguely aware of an increasing sound in the distance.

The front of his armor has been sliced open, the hybrid metal and Kevlar plates exposed beneath the specialized carbon-nanotube surface. With one brief cough, Robin wiped away a trickle of blood from his chin and looked at the robot. His eyes, even concealed behind a mask, were clear and sharp.

"Then I…will give…more."

"…you're a liar." Marissa said, and primed the flamethrower.

The roaring crashes nearly made her heart stop. The distant noise she had been vaguely aware of had suddenly spiked into the area of a giant about to kick down her door and eat her for supper. The horrendous din made her body act just ahead of her hands, the controls twisting at the wrong angle as she activated her weapon at the same time she tried to whirl around and see what had happened.

Nothing broke down the door. The noise faded away almost as swiftly as it had started…

It was not fast enough for Marissa to correct her aim. The Jabberwocky's flame blast went wide, Robin only having to take two steps to the right to avoid it. He'd heard the noise himself, and used it, breaking into his fastest sprint towards the Jabberwocky. Marissa at first tried to correct the fire blast's direction and finish off the Titan, and then after two seconds she realized what was going on and shut the fire off.

She wasn't fast enough, and Robin leapt up onto the Jabberwocky itself, pressing a button on his utility belt to activate magnets in his gloves and boots as he did so. Clutching onto the machine, he scrambled up its arm, just avoiding Marissa's attempt to brush him off. Marissa twisted a dial to electrify the body of the Jabberwocky, but Robin held on, his gloves and boots specially insulated (in his boot's case, in an inner lining beneath the steel) to protect himself. Unable to hold the charge long without damaging the machine's inner workings, Marissa turned it off and tried to claw Robin off the machine's back. Robin put a monkey to shame in his dodging, finally whipping out his metal staff and hammering it against the interlocked plates on the machine's back.

Marissa almost snorted. The Jabberwocky's armor could deflect most modern bullets, a young man beating it with a metal stick wasn't going to do much…

Except it was Robin. Marissa had heard that he and his mentor had once taken out an Amazo. Her work was NOT yet up to Professor Ivo's standards…which meant she had to get him off. Clawing for him again, Marissa hissed through her teeth as he again managed to avoid it. She tried lashing the Jabberwocky's own back with its tail, but she couldn't get a good angle for any proper impact. When she tried to activate the full body taser again, she was informed the battery had not yet fully recharged.

And all the while, Robin kept hammering away at the machine.

"WHY WON'T YOU JUST DIE!" Marissa screamed, and finally seized her controls and ran the Jabberwocky backwards and directly into a wall. Robin scrambled over and flipped onto the machine's front before she could complete the crush, but Marissa had anticipated that.

"Burn in hell, liar." Marissa said, and activated the flamethrower. Even if he wasn't dangling directly in front of its mouth, being in such close proximity to such intense heat would probably cook most of his skin down to the bone through convection.

Good riddance to bad rubbish.

* * *

Marissa had no idea how lucky she was that the rampage had merely skirted past her. The Lord and Raven's battle had reached such an intense pitch that only chance had kept the Lord from crashing or blasting into Marissa's control room and smearing her all over the walls. It was a bizarre mix of focus and frenzy, with the Lord attacking the sorceress like a plague, gladly tearing through anything he had to to try and get at her.

Raven, by now, honestly couldn't tell if he was trying to use her empathy abilities against her or had literally lost himself in his rage. She found she didn't care. Her need to surprise the Lord with her reliquary seals had prevented her from mounting absolute defenses against them, and if the Lord drew the fight out too long, she'd find HER powers start to get locked down as well.

Raven, finding herself reaching another wall, teleported through it, appearing in the room beyond. She found it absolutely covered in weapons, every type of hand-held killing implement that ever existed. The wall she'd phased through promptly exploded, and Raven deflected a wayward mace before the Lord blurred across the floor at her.

Slashes manifested on the floor around Raven, and a second later, on the walls. The Lord turned around from where his charging assault had finished, grimacing as Raven dropped her shield. He hadn't even managed to damage her cloak.

"You know you want to." Raven said. The Lord sneered, and then lifted his hands, claws withdrawing back into his fingers. A pair of curved blades flew into his hands, an cutlass and a sica.

"You say it is the good cause that hallows even war? I say unto you: it is the good war that hallows ANY CAUSE." The Lord said, and blurred at Raven again. His blades shattered on her shield, and he immediately veered off and grabbed up two more, a fu tao and a macuahuitl. Slashing the swords at the ground, producing a shower of sparks, the Lord seized the brief cinders with his power and greatly magnified their effect, throwing the blazing embers against Raven's shield before he blurred away again. Raven waited a second, and then dodged to the side while keeping up her shield, the Lord failing in his attempt to attack her from above. With a lash of her own power, she broke these two weapons as well, sending the Lord tumbling backwards. The Lord snorted, and called a six-foot flamberg blade to his hand, black fire alighting on its edge as he stared Raven down.

"Whoever does not know how to hit the nail on the head-"

The Lord swung his sword down, smashing it against the ground and hurling the flaming pieces at Raven. Instantly, the Lord called a rapier to his hand and followed immediately in their wake, stabbing the point at Raven.

"SHOULD BE ASKED NOT TO HIT IT AT ALL!"

The tip of the sword sank into the dark energies surrounding Raven, the sorceress holding one hand out as a focus, even as the fiery pieces ripped and tore at the rest of her shield. Raven's face betrayed not an iota of strain, though it pressed down on her mind and body with the intensity of a planet's gravity.

"…_**HOW?"**_ The Lord whispered. He was throwing all 'his weight' behind his stab, and he STILL couldn't get through.

"You should know. You made this."

Raven clenched her hand.

The Lord's sword exploded, along with every single weapon in the room. The Lord was repelled by the spell, his body ripped to shreds in the storm of debris. The fact that he swiftly reformed meant nothing to him. Those had been HIS weapons. They should have just passed through him like air, not had him react like he was…

…so far below what he was.

"I endure." Raven said. "You will not."

The Lord merely stared. Several long pregnant seconds passed.

Where the Lord's blade failed, his hand succeeded, the Lord finally ripping through the shield and seizing Raven by the throat.

" _**NEITHER WILL YOU."**_

The rending energies exploded upward around Raven as the Lord lifted her off her feet, trying to skin her alive. Raven just thrust her hand directly into the Lord's mocking face and blasted him so hard she blew the entire room apart.

* * *

Outside, one of the spires of Etemenanki exploded near its base, then collapsed on itself in a plume of choking smoke. Torment, having just knocked Scalpel away, paused to look at the tower's disintegration.

"Is that good or bad?"

Cyborg smashed into the Genocide member, the two tumbling briefly before metal tendrils shot out of Cyborg's left arm, wrapping around Torment's waist, even as Cyborg put his sonic cannon directly against Torment's head and fired. The intense concussive forced ripped into the villain's head, but after a moment of flailing he began punching Cyborg repeatedly in the metallic side of his head, denting in the molybdenum steel.

Down below, Savior knelt by Starfire, checking her for injuries as best he could. Whether by underestimation or sadism, the alien didn't seem to have any broken bones, but that really meant nothing. The bastard might have banged her brain against the inside of her skull until it was mush, among other things. Worse, he knew Kory wouldn't let that keep her down.

"Noel…"

"Stay down Star."

"I can fight…"

"Yes, you can, but for now the others will."

"…I'm sorry…" Starfire said, and Savior knew she wasn't apologizing for any failure.

"…Yeah. So am I." Savior said. "So am I."

"We're good, right? Right? Okay. We've made up. Now let's go pound Torment into a fine powder." Gauntlet said, running past the duo, having paused a second to check on Starfire himself.

"…Be right behind you." Savior said, before the sound of more distant explosions briefly caught his attention. Etemenanki continued to be ravaged by the war that was going on inside it, but despite all the damage, the tower continued to come off as functional. Savior vaguely remembered how it had rebuilt itself when Cyborg had tried blasting it with the T-Oceanus cannon. Maybe the fact that some damaged seemed to be being retained meant that that had slowed down or stopped when the Lord started ending up on the ropes…

If he still was.

No. No time for doubt. Back to being a bastard…

…wasn't that what he was, now? No matter what?

After a few strikes Cyborg released his enemy, shifting his sonic cannon back to a hand, a few sparks escaping from the damage to his head. Torment had not shrugged off the sonic blast; blood trickled from his nose and had turned the whites of his eyes scarlet.

"You ever wonder what might have happened if your father had just let you die, like you'd wanted?" Torment said.

"No. That was a different boy." Cyborg said, and opened up his chest and shoulders and fired missiles towards the Genocide member. With a wave of his hand, Torment blew the missiles out of the air with psychokinetic force, his own arm converting back to his rail cannon.

Cyborg promptly shot his rocket fist at Torment.

Torment's own arm abruptly made two abrupt changes and fired out a spiraling ray that grabbed onto the flying metal fist. Cyborg moved to disrupt what he thought was the stasis ray, only to find the energy pulse he'd developed for it unresponsive.

"Magnets! How do they work?" Torment said, and promptly threw Cyborg's arm back into him. "In all sorts of neat ways!"

Cyborg was pushed backwards by the strike, but that didn't keep him from immediately re-attaching his arm and trying to activate his diamagnetism field. He succeeded, which just prompted Torment to blur forward and kick him in the chest so hard Cyborg swore he felt a dent in his back smooth out. His jetpack malfunctioned, and he plummeted from the sky.

"You know…you do pretty damn well for what you have, but it's not enough. All you have are weapons. I _am _a weapon." Torment said. "You should read the writing I wrote on your teammate's body. You are outclassed and outgunned…"

"WOLVERINNNNNEEESSSSSS!"

Gauntlet slammed the semi trailer-sized energy axe against Torment. Torment blocked it with one arm, but the fact that he got pushed back and grimaced said it all.

"You ARE aware most of the heroes DIED in that film, right? Making a suicidal last stand?"

"Your mother."

"She's not the one who's going to be crying over her son's corpse." Torment said, extending his remaining back spires. "In a closed casket funeral."

The diamond blades sliced into Torment again. This time, Terra didn't bother with probing for a weak point or going for disabling pain; instead, she just tried to tear Torment's face off. Torment yelled and backhanded Gauntlet's axe away, grabbing at the daggers before he snarled and golden lines lit up on his arms.

"THIS SHIT _AGAIN_? REALLY? _REALLY_?"

Needle-shaped rays flew out of his fingers, striking the diamond pieces and vaporizing them to nothing. Terra felt the backlash in her head, the young woman almost losing her balance and falling off her rock, while Torment wiped blood away from his face.

"Forget a casket. They'll bury you all in a matchbox."

"Crane kick!"

"Oh are you really-" Torment said as he looked to where Gauntlet was speaking.

Gauntlet promptly slammed a yellow energy construct into Torment. Specifically, one shaped like a crane and launched from the sole of his shoe. Torment was more surprised than hurt, but he still ended up crashing into the ground, Gauntlet landing nearby a second later.

"Kinda had to stretch with that one, didn't we?" Torment said.

"We'd better end this fight soon. I think we're running out of fight banter."

"Fine. Surrender." Torment said, raising one arm and manifesting a shield that Morgue's energy blasts flew into.

"No, I'm just saying, it's time to shut up and FIGHT!" Gauntlet said, running forward and lancing out a gauntlet-fist. Torment blurred away.

"You've been fighting ever since you got on this island. You haven't gotten very far, and your journey's about to end. Do you really think going silent will help?" Torment said, rapidly flying around Gauntlet, constantly dodging his energy-punches. "Just give up. It will be easier."

"Then at least I don't have to listen to your stupid voice any more."

"Yes yes, joke away. You're good at it." Torment said, and phase-blurred away from both Beast Boy's raptor strike and then Scalpel's attempted sword-cleave. "See, that's the thing. You want to be happy, but your happiness comes from all over the place. The master also wants to be happy. Only one thing will do it for him. Do you really think you can stand against that?"

"Nuh-uh. We're done talking. Fighting time now."

"Fine." Torment said, and blurred forward. Gauntlet punched towards him, and Torment punched back. The shockwave from the impact sent the blonde-haired Titan tumbling backwards, even as pain shot up his arm.

"Look what he did. LOOK AT ME." Torment said. "I was just some punk. Now I'm ten times stronger than all of you! To get him what he wants. And what he wants is this world. And all of you broken at his feet. What great trials of your lives haven't come without his touch? You think anything will change if you somehow win here? IT WON'T. HE CAN'T BE STOPPED. HE WON'T BE. THIS. IS. HOPELESS."

Another massive explosion sounded from Etemenanki, this one so loud it again got the whole battlefield's attention. Cyborg was able to make out the faint remains of a train-sized blast fading away after having exited one of the central towers of the citadel: someone had blasted one hell of a hole in the wall. Torment cocked his head, apparently able to tell something the others couldn't.

"Damn, that bitch is stubborn."

The Shimmer wrapped itself around Torment's arms, back, and shoulders, Savior planting his knee into the center of Torment's spine. The blow did nothing, but Savior hadn't expected it to. It was just to serve as a brace.

"WE ALL ARE."

Savior promptly rammed the Shimmer as hard as he could into Torment's ears. This time, he didn't stop at just trying to stun the villain. Or stop at all.

"You think you can-Ahhhh! AHHH!" Torment yelled, as he found Savior wasn't backing off. The Lord _had _known this trick very well, and had constructed potent magical defenses in Torment's design to thwart it; Savior felt like he was sticking the Shimmer into a food processor from hell. He still refused to relent, not this time, even as agony exploded through every inch of his body. His rage kept pace with it though, as he tried to bore through Torment's inner ear and reach his brain.

"Get off me! Stop it!" Torment yelled, electrifying himself. Savior held on, utilizing the Shimmer's invulnerability to conduction. Torment thrust his hands behind him and fired explosive blasts, said blasts exploding on Noel, but the efforts the Titan was making disrupted Torment's concentration and kept the attacks from being disabling/fatal or being able to dislodge Noel. "GET OFF ME! STOP IT!"

Blood began running down Savior's hands, dripping towards the ground before the heat from Torment's body evaporated it, motes of red dust drifting down onto the ground in the liquid's death. Torment finally extended blades from his fingers and clawed at the Shimmer, but he failed to cut through it completely, the pain becoming backwash in the tidal wave Savior was already trying to crest.

"Jesus Christ." Beast Boy said, standing nearby. He began trying to recall the form of an alien animal that could endure electricity (as Torment was still shocking Savior), and suffered an unfortunate blanking period. He took one step forward, pondering that maybe he could pull Noel off, only for Terra to stop him.

"No! You'll get hurt!"

"But…!" Beast Boy said, before turning to Gauntlet. "Rob! Get him off!"

"Why?" Gauntlet said, uncharacteristically cold. "Isn't he just disabling him?"

"Yeah but…but…!" Beast Boy said, looking back and forth.

"WHY ARE YOU ALL STANDING AROUND?" Torment screamed at the Titans, bringing out his gray tendrils and trying to yank Savior off. "HE'S TRYING TO KILL ME!"

"So are you!" Terra snapped.

"SO YOU'RE JUST GOING TO STAND THERE AND LET HIM SLIT MY THROAT? BECAUSE I'M A BAD GUY? GREAT WORK BEING THE GOOD GUYS, ASSHOLES! I'D LAUGH EXCEPT, FUCKKKKKK!" Torment yelled, stumbling around. Cyborg watched, trying to decide on a course of action. He wanted to trust Noel, and would have…five minutes ago. Now…

"Maybe I could shoot him?" Morgue said, aiming her gun.

"No! You could hit Savior!" Cyborg said. "Scalpel…damn it, metal fingers, you'd just get electrocuted!"

"Zap him with that disabling tech Cyborg!" Terra said.

"No, he can barely keep ahead of the bastard's electricity, we add our own and he's going into v-fib." Scalpel said.

"Yeah! Let him finish! This is what he's good at!" Gauntlet said,

"We can't just let him KILL him!" Beast Boy said.

"Who said he was killing him?" Morgue yelled.

"Who said he WASN'T?" Terra shot back

"Raven says it's a trick and Savior is our teammate! If we think he's going to kill him because of something the Lord said, then we have more than a few trust issues! Fine! If you don't trust Savior, ask yourself if you trust Raven!" Scalpel said. Terra again looked uncertain, and opened her mouth to reply…

Only for Starfire to fly in in a drunken lurch, her eyes wide and alarmed.

"Friends please-!" Was all the alien got out.

"RARRRRRGGGHHHHHHHHHHHH!" Torment roared, having grabbed onto the Shimmer itself. "I'D LOVE TO STAND AROUND AND WATCH YOUR ASSHOLES JUSTIFY KILLING ME, BUT FUCK YOU!"

Torment pulled as hard as he could, and Savior's own scream merged with the Genocide member as Torment ripped the Shimmer probes out of his ears, the villain smashing Savior violently into the ground before stomping on him with a bone-rattling impact. He'd done his best to do…whatever he'd planned, but Torment had been just too strong.

"…and thank you. For standing around with your thumbs up your asses." Torment said, and his body lit up with energy. "You're all going to die out here now."

Starfire blasted Torment in the face. Torment didn't even blink.

"Thank you also for not doing that fifteen seconds ago. Heroes."

Torment blurred over and backhanded Scalpel into a nearby boulder, then turned around and used his gravity blaster to propel a rhinoceros-Beast Boy into the air and over him before the animal crashed into another rock face.

"…aye aye sir." Torment said, and leapt into the air, dodging Cyborg's sonic blast and firing three of his own that exploded amongst the Titans, Torment blurring away in mid-air and disappearing.

"Cyborg, orders!" Gauntlet yelled, trying to sweep the obscuring dust cloud away. Cyborg was way ahead of Gauntlet, calculating several new plans of attack and running them against the possibility of re-starting the wear-him-down strategy against Torment…

Cyborg stepped to the side, Torment's fist striking the air where his chest had been a microsecond later. The Titan hadn't come this far to fall for such an old dirty trick, and promptly blasted Torment in the face. Torment flew backwards, but fired his own blast as he did, sending Cyborg twisting backwards in turn.

"Kory, you have to…!" Gauntlet said, trying to support the alien. "You're not exactly in prize shape here…!"

"Will die on my feet…if it puts him…on his back…"

There was another explosion, and Scalpel and Morgue went tumbling past the pair. Gauntlet barely managed to pull Starfire out of the way of another blast, stone pelting his back as Torment touched down before him.

"Feet, back, knees, handstand, it doesn't really matter what position you fill, princess. Your reign is over."

"Not if we crown _you_." Gauntlet said, and lashed a bludgeon at Torment. Torment smirked and blocked it with both forearms.

"Heh. Give me your kings…let me squeeze them in my hands!" Torment said, and kicked the Gauntlet away before he unleashed his gravity cannon on the pair, smashing them down into the ground. "Your puny princes! Your so-called leaders of your land!"

Beast Boy leapt off the cliff and pounced onto Torment as a wolf. Torment grabbed him out of the air and tossed him into Gauntlet and Starfire as they tried to get up.

"I'll eat them whole before I'm done! The battle's fought and the game is won!" Torment said, cloned Birdarangs and explosives emerging from all over his body and spiraling around him. "I am the one, the only one! I am the god of kingdom come! GIMME THE PRIZE!"

Death filled the air, death from blades and fire and smoke, all underscored by the delighted laughter of a godly warrior.

* * *

There was no smell.

The air was sterile, lacking even the faintest trace of any odor. Even the room filled with toxic vapor had possessed no aroma, good or bad. Just another sign how unnatural the tower was, something Raven had only noticed as she floated before the Lord, her cloaks drifting around her, watching the Lord breath through his nose. The fact that he technically did not have a nose and continued to demonstrate such an old reflex as faux-breathing said it all for how this battle had gone for him. Bits and pieces of the floor the pair had just broken up through tumbled off both their bodies, and Raven reached up and, in a humiliating dismissive gesture, ran a hand through her hair to get rid of the dust.

The Lord 'drew', firing as fast as he could in the gap in Raven's defense. There was no actual gap, and Raven deflected the blast with her hand. The Lord fired off several more, and Raven deflected them all, the attacks exploding around her.

"…can't…" The Lord said, before he abruptly vomited onto his hand again. Well, maybe vomit was the wrong word, but he did abruptly expel darkness in liquid form from his mouth, and Raven couldn't think of another word that fit. The Lord looked at the mess with disgust and then threw it aside, the liquid hissing as it struck the ground. "You…bitch…"

"Sounds more like you." Raven said, her calm intonation finally starting to be subsumed under her anger. She'd kept herself under murderous focus this whole fight, and she didn't plan to stop now…but even winning came at a cost.

"…human…" The Lord rasped. "Human…can't do this…you're…HUMAN…"

"Really?" Raven said, her tone that of bored incredulity, like the Lord had somehow forgotten a very important fact.

"Turned your back on your father…tried so DESPERATELY to deny him…makes you…human…" The Lord said, before he coughed up more 'blood'. "Humans can't do this…can't advance this far…I cast off your damn flesh, I learned to break the cage of time…a mere girl with a grudge CANNOT surpass _me_…!"

Raven lashed out her hands, gold-tipped claws raking across the Lord, driving him back.

"Broke you…why are you not broken…" The Lord whispered.

"That's the benefit of flesh. It heals." Raven said, her eyes cold. "Darkness just fades away. As will you."

The Lord's murderous rage was a lot more evident in _his _eyes as he held his wounded chest for a few seconds before drawing it away. His hand clenched, and runes began to light up on his fist.

Raven thrust out her hands, attempting to dissect the spell before it completed.

She promptly realized that was exactly what the Lord wanted her to do, the backlash of the lure slamming into her mind. Chains immediately ripped out from the floors above and below Raven, tangling her up as the Lord wrapped his hand around his fist. Raven felt a deep chill sink into her body. He'd just jammed her teleportation.

"I think you will find, blackbird, that flesh is FAR MORE LIMITED THAN YOU REALIZE." The Lord said, crimson energy arcing up his arm. "NO MATTER HOW WILLING THE SPIRIT!"

The Lord reared back and thrust out his hands, the blast he fired expanding outward to engulf Raven.

Raven's own eyes flashed with anger, and the portal opened up in front of her, the blast flying into it. Raven immediately opened a second portal behind her, and the gigantic blast promptly blew a hole in the wall behind her so big Raven felt the tower spire sag and threaten to collapse on their heads. A moment later, her powers shattered the chains.

"…weak…"

Raven's eyes went dark again as she whispered the word, a darkness so deep even the Lord took notice. It kept him from noticing Raven's fist before she hammered directly upside the head.

"YOU THINK ME WEAK? _**YOU!**_" Raven thundered, and kicked the Lord so hard she ripped a portion of his torso off with the blow, the shadow flying apart into dust before Raven blasted the Lord into the wall. "DO YOU KNOW WHAT WEAKNESS IS?"

The Lord blasted right back off the wall, lashing out with his cloak, the darkness extending and turning into blades. Raven leapt over it and hammered the Lord into the ground with another blast.

"Weakness is hiding behind a front man to try and confront your mortal enemies!" Raven snapped.

The Lord punched the floor, and parts of the wall and ceiling warped and fired piercing lasers at Raven. She twirled around them like a demonic ballerina, and when the Lord rose from her blow she blurred in and punched him in the face again.

"Weakness is destroying a man's mind with poison and turning what remains into a suicide bomber, AND CALLING IT TRUTH!"

The Lord snarled and blurred away, and Raven herself vanished into darkness. Several parts of the room thundered as blows were exchanged at inhuman speed, before the pair finally returned with Raven seizing onto the Lord with a claw and slamming him into the ceiling head first before she began hammering the Lord into every single solid surface that was left in the room.

"Weakness is finding a hurt, scared child, raping her mind, and saying YOU MADE HER BETTER! While she lives in terror of EVERYTHING! WHILE YOU FEED ON IT!" Raven screamed, her ambient energies having reaches the point where her hair had started waving around like it was being subjected to a giant fan. "**YOU **call **ME **_**WEAK? **_I SPIT ON YOUR HYPOCRISY!"

Smashing the Lord into the ground, Raven blurred in again. The Lord slashed out his arm, firing a dozen needle-like blasts.

Raven weaved through them all, an impossible dodge, and as her hand shone gold, she plunged it into the Lord's chest.

"HELL WILL BE A MERCY COMPARED TO ME." Raven raged, the golden light erupting within her foe…

She never saw the Lord's fist as he smashed it directly into her throat. The light died instantly, and Raven staggered back, the darkness also fading from her wide eyes.

"…you should be more wary of just what being hard means." The Lord murmured, putting a hand on his chest as he closed the wound. "It means things like trying to drastically ramp up an area of magic you're not as skilled in and pausing to consider that it could prove…disadvantageous. That's the problem with flesh. Needs air. Recalling that…Raven?"

Raven had no reply. Could not reply, as she gasped for air, blood spilling from her mouth. She held up a hand to her throat, darkness flaring and then fading, and seemingly doing nothing.

"Yeah…hurts, doesn't it? That's the thing about pain, child. Its pendulum swings are defined by few and expected by even fewer. A lesson you made rather brutally clear, these past moments of time." The Lord said, as he touched his head and briefly closed his eyes before opening them. "You don't define weakness, Raven. You define justice. What I do, what you do…it's all the same rage at defied justice. The only difference is I actually know what's right for the world. You? Well, we've had this argument before." The Lord said, walking over and knocking aside Raven's hand before he grabbed her by her crushed throat, lifting her up. "You lose. I have truth. You have faith. A casual stroll through the lunatic asylum shows that faith does not prove anything."

Raven coughed up more blood, the liquid falling onto the Lord's hand.

Even as the texture of Raven's throat changed beneath it. The Lord's eyes went wide.

Raven slammed her hand into the Lord's chest, impaling the tiny object she held there, the Lord recoiling and screaming at its touch. He tried to keep going backwards and found himself stopping as Raven hit the ground, a gesture from her arresting the Lord's backwards stride.

"There are no facts. ONLY INTERPRETATIONS." Raven said, and brought her hands together. Above her left hand floated a small, spiny golden ball, the sun cast in metal. In her right hand was her mirror, from which the final artifact had been hidden. Her mad attack had been anything but, instead being a lure for the Lord to strike at a perceived weakness. Raven had offered two possibilities (the other had been her stomach and kidneys) and had shields ready to manifest at either location. When he'd selected her throat, she'd faked coughing up blood and drawn the Lord's attention away from her other hand as she summoned the mirror and from it the relic.

Misdirection. All magic was based on it. Especially things like this, as a mass of golden rays fired out of the golden orb and impaled into the Lord, the shadow-god unable to escape, block, or dodge the strike. For good reason; she'd already connected him to it.

"How did you…I scann-ARGH!" The Lord said, trying to fire a blast at Raven. The attack fell apart almost the second it left her hand, and Raven absorbed the mirror back into herself, leaving the frozen star.

"You're a child yourself, Lord." Raven said. She felt the tug of tradition, the urge to explain how her mirror, a part of her, probably _could _have been detected by a legitimate master mage, and by extent, the reliquary she'd hidden inside it. But the Lord was not as good as he liked to think he was. He'd taken shortcuts in his learning process, and was far too enamored with his ability to use darkness as 'fuel' to learn the subtle details of many things. He'd tried scanning her after she'd used the first relic on him (she'd felt it), and had failed to spot the second one. After she'd used said second one, he'd tried what he considered a deep, absolute scan, which wasn't. Raven had not taken any chances though, having hidden the magical object beneath as many layers as she could. Until now.

"_**WHAT ARE YOU DOING?"'**_

Raven said nothing, remaining where she was as wisps of golden mist began to hiss out from the Lord's wounds. The answer was rather simple. The Lord had stolen from her power, tried to remake what he'd taken as part of himself. He had not succeeded, not fully, not then, and not now. Back then, in their first great battle, she'd used that part of herself to access the Lord's greater power and wield it, briefly, for her own ends.

This time, she wasn't taking. This time, this final time, she was freely giving. Giving over her power…and the golden radiance she'd laced into it. She'd accessed the Lord's veins, and she was pouring poison into it.

She would not stand here and tell him that as an explanation. If the situation was reversed, that was what _he_ would do.

"Ahhh…no…can't…CAN'T-!" The Lord lamented, thrusting his hands, his spells and offense failing before he could fully manifest them. He fell to his knees, beginning to crawl away. Raven followed, her hands still out, her relic shining all the brighter.

* * *

Marissa almost didn't notice the alarms, as Robin had distracted her. Specifically, by scrambling over to the side of the Jabberwocky literally half a second before she could roast him with the flamethrower, the Titan leader moving at speeds that seemed beyond human. Marissa had screamed a curse and clawed for Robin, but he'd escaped that as well, scrambling back up onto the Jabberwocky's back and resuming beating on it with his staff.

**WARNING. POWER LEVELS OF ETEMENANKI FAILING.**

"What?" Marissa finally said, said warnings having gone from audio to visual as well. She immediately checked the layout of her systems and found them undamaged. Rather, it was like Etemenanki itself was losing power…which should have been impossible.

It was happening anyway, as the lights far above Robin and the Jabberwocky began to flicker and shift. Made of specialized crystal (so the Jabberwocky could more easily absorb the rays of it), the lights had gone unnoticed by Robin the entire fight. Had one not exploded, he might not have noticed anyway. Inside her post, Marissa attempted to stabilize her computer systems and keep her attack going; it wasn't her job to keep Etemananki supplied with power. She had to stick to the plan. If she failed, the Lord would be angry…

Torment, meanwhile, was suffering from a deeper disquiet and was even more confused by it. He couldn't get indigestion, not any more…then what was this feeling-?

Scalpel reminded him there were more important things by kicking him across the face. Torment went flying, and with an irritated snarling roar, he activated his magnetic blaster and seized control of Scalpel's claws. Beast Boy was coming up beside him as a bear, and Torment tried to swing the alien's hands into his teammates' side. Much to Torment's complete surprise, Scalpel RESISTED, and Beast Boy ended up veering around the attempted attack and pouncing onto Torment before tearing into his face and chest with his powerful claws. Torment tried to blast him off, and got another surprise; a firing delay. Beast Boy fled before he could get removed, and Torment stood up in time for a Starbolt to nearly knock him down again.

"The fuck is this…!"

Gauntlet punched Torment into the ground.

"It's called a blind spot, asshole!"

* * *

How had things gone so wrong…she was just a girl…

The pain was starting to fade, which the Lord did not think was a good sign, especially considering the cold numbness that the actual pain was being replaced by. He had to get out of this, had to get back to the ritual room…he'd prepared, he'd had things in place in case they interrupted his liturgy, he'd prepared for Raven and all her thrice-damned righteous rage…how in all of the hells had she gotten so far beyond his preparations? She'd had a bitter grudge to nurse, and no way to direct it properly. She didn't understand hate, not like the Lord did. For her kind, it was a blinder, a volatile fuel that was as likely to destroy them as drive them. It was why they were equally blind to the greater truth of humanity, that the species was so obsessed with seeking and propagating reasons to hate that the Titans, working at cross-purposes, would be ground underfoot. It should have undermined all her efforts. It should have wrecked havoc with her empath powers. It should have exposed her once and for all for why she was WRONG, why she was a bane to this world, NOT HIM…how was this HAPPENING? THIS WASN'T THE WAY THIS WORLD WORKED.

IT NEEDED HIM. IT WOULD DIE WITHOUT HIM.

WHY THE HELL COULDN'T THEY UNDERSTAND?

"…you…you…" The Lord whispered, as he continued trying to crawl away. The retreat finally ended when one of the Lord's arms disintegrated, and when the Lord thudded to the ground, he realized he couldn't reform it. His body was breaking down completely, Raven not letting a trace escape. Somehow, he managed to drag himself around to face her.

Raven looked into the Lord's dark eyes. With his powers slowly ceasing, the black pit aspect of his eyes was fading, replaced by traditional, if dark, human eyes. There was hate in those eyes, and rage, but there was also confusion. Confusion and desperation.

She held her gaze and kept her eyes open. Despite his madness, the Lord was not lacking intelligence and cunning. He could still try something, and she had to be ready to shut it down.

"You would…" The Lord said.

"It's not murder. It's self-defense." Raven said, cutting off that argument before it started.

"You think…"

"YOU DON'T THINK. You desire and dismiss. The world has seen enough of such ambitions."

"Humanity-!"

"IS BETTER THAN YOU." Raven said. "I don't know who passes ultimate judgment, but it will _NOT BE YOU_."

The Lord made a strangling sound in his throat.

"…please…"

Raven narrowed her eyes, doing a quick scan of the room. Checking her flanks.

"Please…don't…" The Lord said, his voice becoming languorous. "I don't…want to…"

Raven grit her teeth slightly as she began to scan.

Fear.

Legitimate, absolute fear. Maybe the Lord was still trying to escape, but it was fraught with despair, a last-ditch chance of throwing everything at the wall, like emptying a handgun into an encroaching tank. He literally had nothing left but to beg.

…GOOD.

HE DESERVED IT. Every single, solitary second of agony, and a million times more. He had the blood of countless thousands on his hands. He'd murdered her fellows without a second thought while telling them they were fools who had wasted their whole lives and deserved to die for it. He'd violated Noel, violated her team, and done worse to Marissa. And he had the gall to ask for MERCY?

He hated humanity so much. MAYBE IT WAS DAMN TIME SHE GAVE HIM A REASON IN HIS LAST MOMENTS.

The same glow lit up in Raven's eyes, and her stream of radiance began an overwhelming torrent. The Lord reared back, screaming and thrashing, and with his misery, Raven found herself smiling. This was his fault. He'd done his best to attack her love, her kindness, everything that made her her. Leaving nothing but her own darkness to fill the void. Getting exactly what he wanted, and discovering…

Raven's heart lurched. Oh fuck. She'd just made a critical tactical error, one that sent her own words echoing back inside her head.

_I can't be human. Not for this._

She'd faltered. She'd let herself be human. The irony was even more bitterly apparent, considering how many years she'd spent repressing her emotions, good and bad. When she'd stopped having to do that, she'd never wanted to go back. And now, when she'd needed it most…

All the king's horses and all the king's men. She'd given in in these last seconds and let herself be human. Or rather, inhuman. The dark echo that lurked in all mortal souls.

The echo that the Lord fed on for power.

Even now.

The midnight energies exploded off the Lord, driving her beam back. Raven immediately tried to re-gather herself and bring the focus back down. She couldn't falter, not now…!

The darkness surged out, meeting her golden beam and holding it. The Lord was a ragged mess, but he was intact enough to fight back. Especially considering how potent the darkness he'd siphoned from her.

She DID have a bitter grudge. The Lord, on the other hand, found it the finest of wines.

"_**ABYSSUS ABYSSUM INVOCAT."**_

Raven braced herself and fought back, before wracking pains shot through her. She'd erred worse than even she realized. She hadn't just given the Lord one last shot in the arm, she'd allowed him access to her very emotional makeup, which was directly tied with her magic, her powers, and all her preparations. He hadn't just stolen a boost, he'd ripped out as many supports on the way out as he could. The end result was her power faltering, the Lord driving it back…

For about 2 and a half seconds. There was one thing one learned about being a benevolent empath, over all others. How to deal with pain. Raven set her feet and fought back, the room beginning to tear apart around them.

She was the better warrior, the stronger magician. She'd directed the battle magnificently, causing the Lord to suffer a massive power drain, which crippled all his main advantages. She was in the right, and she'd made a promise. She was a Titan. She was a hero. All her life had been leading up to this day, her greatest task to save it…

She had also just driven the Lord to the brink of death. And was fighting on _his _turf.

Marissa's computers abruptly shut down completely. A second later, the lights followed. All over Etemananki, the crackling arcs of power and drifting streams of dark energy vanished.

The power was now in the Lord's hands, and with one final defiant roar, he put it all into one shot. Raven's own power was shattered before him, the tidal wave of midnight coming for her. NO…!

Raven wrapped her cloaks around herself and manifested everything she had. She still felt the attack rip through her defenses, and her, like a thousand vicious beasts. She held her ground anyway, secreting away her solar reliquary to protect it from the Lord. Even as her flesh burned and screamed, she felt bloody hands trying to pry into her mind, and upon being repelled, trying to take as much of her with them as they could.

It was as if Hell had opened up its eye, and its gaze burned through every inch of Raven. And it would not rest until it found her wanting.

* * *

"Cyborg?" Savior said, her voice coming over the Titan's communicator.

"Yeah?" Cyborg said, as he fired his sonic cannon at Torment, who struggled to shrug it off. The teen machine wasn't sure what was going on, but he'd save his questions for when Torment was face down on the ground in a pool of his own blood.

"I think we have a-"

Savior was interrupted by Torment firing another storm of micro-missiles, the white-haired Titan throwing up a shield. He could feel the lesser potency though, like the explosions of the detonating projectiles didn't have the same kick. Had Torment been poker-facing about how drained he was?

Or did it had something to do with how Etemananki had abruptly gone dark?

"We have a what?" Cyborg yelled.

"Problem, I…!" Savior said, and then had to dodge again as Torment blasted cutting lasers from his palms across the battlefield. Leaping into the sky, Torment was immediately grounded by Terra, the geokinetic shattering a rock over his body. Torment snarled in rage and lashed out, grabbing Terra with his stasis ray and slamming her into the ground. His back spires slid down onto his arm again; this time, instead of firing a blast, it fired a sphere of power directly at the girl. Starfire's flew in, and with one precisely aimed Starbolt, knocked it off course, the attack dissipating rather than striking elsewhere and exploding. With another snarl, Torment manifested a Birdarang and hurled it at the weakened alien, catching her in the forehead and knocking her down with a splash of blood.

Savior's eyes, flicking around the battlefield, spied the back spire he'd ripped from Torment nearby, still impaled into the ground. For a moment, he debated picking it up and trying the 'pierce with a piece' tactic again, but quickly figured that Terra had probably exhausted the 'repeat offense' well and instead sprang over to protect the two women, even as Scalpel seized Torment from behind and promptly slammed his head into the ground.

"Terra?" Savior asked. The Titan was getting up, but she didn't answer. Cyborg touched down as well, firing sonic blasts at Torment as he kicked Scalpel away. Morgue flew down as bats to join him with _Dyson's Fear._

Savior stared at Cyborg a moment. He was just caught up in the heat of battle, right? He wasn't ignoring him…he'd never do that, no matter what.

Then Torment was returning fire, spraying the group with duplicated explosives, and Savior threw himself into the defense.

* * *

It was over.

Raven collapsed, her breath burning in her lungs. Her cloak had been ripped to shreds, gashes and burns evident on both exposed and concealed flesh. But she was alive.

Alive…and crippled, the pain being joined by a new sense of inanition and weight. The Lord hadn't just done her harm. She'd had to brute force the effects of her magical relics on him, and with the Lord's last attack ripping her defenses to shreds, that choice of tactics had finally caught up to her. The disabling magicks had sank in, stealing her own powers just as they had the Lord's. Between that, and the efforts she'd just expended to survive, she'd bottomed out. She'd need a few moments to recover.

The old saw was that Raven didn't know if she had those moments. It didn't apply here. The Lord might have beaten her in this blast war, undoing her attempt to undo him, and she might now be under the same burden he was, but that didn't magically restore him to full power. He was still running on fumes, and he'd just drained the tower dry to try and kill her. It had failed. Maybe she was now being held by her own chains, but they remained on the Lord in turn, and he'd been carrying them a lot longer. In a straight fight, she could still, WOULD still, win. If he decided he wanted to end it with a fistfight, she'd win that too. And he knew it.

She could see it in his eyes. His now-human eyes, as he looked across the room at her, his ornate armor having finally just given way to generic cloaks and vaguely defined clothes as he'd been forced to regenerate it over and over. She looked back, battered but unbowed.

"…Raven…" The Lord said. "…why, oh why, did we have to be on opposing sides? The tales we could have told…"

"I'd rather die." Raven said.

"I know." The Lord said.

Then he thrust down his hands. Raven felt the power wash over her. It wasn't an attack, it was a…drain?

What was he feeding on now? Was he stealing the power he'd given Torment? That would accomplish nothing: the Titans would run over and join her and they'd probably kick his ass faster. It would never work…

Marissa? Even her pain couldn't turn the tide here…

…the things in the basement? Too chaotic. Too hard to control. What else could he drain? He…

…he…

…oh NO.

* * *

Ryce had calmed down.

It had not been done by conscious choice. Gripping the kitchen counter, her claws sank into it without her realizing it. Something was…off. Something was wrong. Something that should not could not—WAS NOT…

Wide-eyed and trying to comprehend the impossible, she did not see the room's exits sealing shut around her.

* * *

"_He's poisoned the island."_

Once again, the words she'd spoken and forgotten crashed down onto Raven's mind. He hadn't just infused this building with his power. He'd infused the whole island of _La Voix_ with it, to stop Terra from just sinking his whole plan before he could even pick a fight. Whether Terra could do that _NOW_ after all her expended efforts and already-endured strain was a good question, but was quickly obliterated by the fact that the Lord had more power to tap (fuck, she'd even seen him doing it earlier and not retained that knowledge) and at the moment, SHE DIDN'T.

Terra suddenly felt a weight lift off her shoulders, but between her pain and stress, she barely noticed. Beast Boy was trying to join his teammates, unable to get close from the sheer amount of explosives Torment was throwing at them…

And Savior had come to a realization. This didn't fit. The way the discs were coming in denoted a desperate attack, but the arcs and focus was completely off. It seemed less like Torment was trying to blow them up as…

Hem then in and pin them down.

Marissa's computers abruptly lit up again, the same light returning to the chamber where Robin remained perched on the Jabberwocky. She stared at them, and then at the ceiling, as the power finished restoring the tower and devoted all that remained to the Lord, dark clouds erupting from his hands, the tower beginning to shake.

"If we win here, we will win everywhere. The world is a fine place, and worth fighting for, AND I HATE VERY MUCH TO LEAVE IT." The Lord said, the power spiraling into his hands. "I WARNED YOU, BLACKBIRD."

The Lord threw back his hands.

Raven stood up, thrusting out her own.

The Lord slammed his hands together, and the piercing black ray erupted from within them. All the power to weaken the very Earth itself, unleashed on Raven's battered and tender flesh…

Until it abruptly curved and flew past her.

"_**THIS STORY ISN'T GOING TO END THE WAY YOU THINK IT WILL."**_

Out the hole the Lord had made earlier. Raven whirled around, eyes wide, and thrust out a hand.

No power came to her call. She'd needed a few more seconds, and the Lord hadn't provided them. Her sealing magicks now bore down on her. She couldn't fly. She couldn't teleport. She didn't even have time to shout a mental warning.

She had nothing. She could do nothing.

…in that hotel, in her full realization of what had occurred, Raven had thought she could never feel so cold. Never again reach the depths that she had fallen into.

The world had no place for such assumptions.

* * *

Gauntlet's swinging bludgeon slammed into Torment's side, finally interrupting his barrage. Cyborg, Terra, and Morgue promptly pinned him down, Beast Boy touching down by Cyborg and waiting for an opening.

Savior did not, and with the racket from their firepower, Savior didn't bother trying to yell over them. He had a suspicion and he needed to confirm it, looking around, seeking the answer. If they were being directed…

_The message none of them had heard._

"_**Weames, CLUSTER THEM."**_

"_Aye aye sir."_

For what purpose?

The blast coming from Etemenanki made no sound. It was pitch black against dark clouds and an island of black, gray, and otherwise dark stone. Even as Savior's eyes went wide, he saw the deadly spear of energy shift at an impossible angle upwards. It wasn't like a mortar or a fire and forget projectile. It was being directed, with powers that outstripped any computer.

Perhaps the worst part was that Noel was not alone in seeing it. Gauntlet did as well, and he opened his mouth to scream.

He had enough battle skill to see Torment coming for him. Whether he was moving to silence him or merely striking back, no one could say. Gauntlet still got his shield between him and the villain.

Torment's blow sounded like the world's biggest beach ball hitting an ocean from orbit, his metal fist straining against, and then ripping through Gauntlet's shield, smashing into his jaw and sending him flying backwards. Scalpel, moving to attack, changed directions and caught his teammate instead, the momentum carrying them away…

Savior opened his own mouth.

_Why would they listen?_

Time seemed to slow down for Noel Collins, and the greater implications of that fact struck him at the core. They wouldn't just not listen because of the noise, or because they were focusing on Torment (who had just creamed one of their teammates). They might not listen because of…Noel himself.

There was no going back from it all. He didn't have time to waste on them dismissing him for even the most minute subconscious reasons. The blast was closing in and by the time the rest noticed…

_Dust in a room…_

Even if they all moved, it was being directed…

_Dust in a room…_

Time slowed for the Titan even further, going from a crawl to seemingly inert. Savior closed his mouth, instead slowly inhaling.

Deciding.

Then he fired off the Shimmer and grabbed up all of his teammates.

"NOEL? WHAT THE F-!"

Savior thrust Starfire into Cyborg's arms and then threw his teammates as hard as he could, tossing them in an overhead arc. Torment's confusion was pricelessly comical; the Titans far less so. In the end, only Starfire managed to meet his eyes. Savior could only say one word.

"Go."

The Titans crashed down forty feet distant, their surprise so great that none of them was able to do more than break their own falls as they tumbled away. Cyborg leaned up from where'd landed, having had a little better control stopping himself with his jets…

He saw the blast. On instinct, he aimed to fire, even though he knew it was too late. The rest of the Titans didn't even get to see the black beam coming down.

Savior turned around, one last thought crossing his mind.

_Go into the ground. Maybe you'll survive._

The response was only in Noel's head, and not with words. The meaning was still crystal clear.

"_This is the Shimmer. I think it's semi-sentient, so you might as well say hello to it too."_

"I'll stay." Two minds spoke.

Raven saw what was coming. Blood erupted from her nose as she tried to tear a single iota of power from her body to stop what was coming…

"_Care to dance?"_

Savior pulled the jacket over his head, thrusting it in front of him. His armor was heaviest on the back. Between that, the Shimmer, and his shield, maybe…maybe…

"_The Teen Titans are just a name, a title, but you have the heart of a true hero. You've earned our respect…and our trust."_

"_Life is not black and white. Nothing is. But it's up to us to make sure that the shades of grey remain distinct as well."_

"_Good will towards men. Whatever path they may walk…or run."_

"_And above all else, in this modern world, where people fight for money, for possessions, for fame, for power, for sex, for jealousy, for revenge, for the need to settle the darkness in their own heart…these people cannot, and maybe never will realize that what you must fight for is ideals. Ideals that are so hard to hang onto, so pitiful in the face of so many things, so easy to discard, mock, abhor. To be a superhero, one must stand tall in the face of all the evidence that was and is to come, the so called verification that such things are foolish, false, repugnant, impossible. One must stand up in the face of all the yelling, all the noise, and say…we can do better then this. The one who stands and does that, with the certainty of gaining nothing but the worst of the world…that is a superhero."_

"_Teen Titans…fitting name."_

"What's in a name?" Savior mused. Time to find out.

The blast came down.

The explosion blew Raven backwards, and send every single Titan tumbling end over end away from the blast with screams of alarmed surprise, and in Cyborg's case, agonized rage. Even Torment, whose eyes had followed the Titans when they'd been thrown, was caught up in it, unable to resist, the tower of fire twisting up to rip through the clouds. The explosion was impossibly focused, expending all its energy in a spiral-like twist that bored through the whole island rather than expand outwards.

And as soon as it had come, it was gone, leaving only smoke. The Titans tried to pick themselves up where they lay, staring at where their teammate had been.

The final gust of hot wind carried it out. The melted, ruined jacket. It drifted on the air for a few more seconds before it caught on the metal spire that had earlier been rammed into the ground, flapping for another two seconds before it went still. A flag to the dead.

Raven couldn't feel her heart any more. It beat still, but she didn't feel it. All she could do was try to pull herself up, try and fail, falling back to her knees, all while looking at the crater.

She'd felt Noel…_CEASE_. The Lord hadn't just blown him up. He'd literally expunged every single aspect of him, body, mind, and soul. There was nothing left, to bury, to move on, nothing. Having nothing else to split the power of the strike, the Lord had chosen to annihilate every single aspect of Noel Collins, leaving him a mere memory and nothing more.

The tears traced a line down her dust and soot covered cheeks, Raven holding one arm out, like her hand could turn back time.

As she felt the presence behind her, moving down to whisper in her ear.

"You will kill ten of our men, and we will kill one of yours…" The Lord said. "And in the end, it will be _**YOU **_who tire of it."

* * *

Marissa was confused and scared, a toxic mix that made her more miserable than she normally was. She had no idea what had just occurred, why the power had shut off and then turned back on…and was now running at lesser efficiency, she noticed.

…But it wasn't her place to question it. Maybe this was some kind of backlash in regards to opening the Foreverwhere. If that was the case, the rest of the Titans did not have long for this world. She had to finish Robin. The Lord was already going to be furious with her, but at least she could prove she was useful, try and give him a reason for not abandoning her…

Robin abruptly leapt off the Jabberwocky, hurling his staff as he did so. It sliced through the air and hit its target clean.

One of the crystal light fixtures. It shattered, and more of the room was plunged into darkness. Robin didn't even watch to see if he'd succeeded, instead sprinting to his discarded sword. Snatching it up, he immediately converted it back into the twin Birdarangs it came from and hurled through the air. Each found its mark in a masterful bit of aim Oliver Queen would have applauded, and more darkness sank over the room…

Marissa stared. What the hell was Robin trying to accomplish? Was he trying to escape? There was no way he could. There was only one exit, and the door was so thick he could have emptied the full contents of his utility belt into it and not gotten out. Her window, even damaged, would resist anything he had left to throw at it. There was absolutely nowhere to run.

Robin sprinted over to his staff, picking it up and throwing it again. Other crystal shattered. Soon the whole room would be dark…

Which meant there would be no light for the Jabberwocky to absorb, Marissa abruptly realized. Which meant no void-camo. Which meant she'd have to pilot the machine in complete darkness, which she had no practice in…against a scion of Batman.

Even with how worn down and offensively limited he was, that idea filled Marissa with mortal dread. The Lord would be furious…even MORE furious…

She had to stop him. Even if it meant putting the Jabberwocky between Robin and the lights. Without light coming in at every angle, placing the machine directly between a light source and Robin would define the shape more and potentially even cast a shadow. But it was better than the alternative, and so Marissa brought the machine to bear and tried to fake out Robin with a charge.

He stood his ground.

Marissa fought down her urge to hesitate and closed in, raising a hand. Her camo still worked, he might still be confused about the distance-!

He was.

He was also Robin. When you fought the Joker repeatedly, you either learned to adapt, or died.

You also learned to keep a trick up your sleeve, and Robin used his, unleashing his final explosive disc towards the Jabberwocky. It took it directly in the right knee, the explosion throwing off the mech's balance and causing it to go crashing forward onto its chest. Robin dodged out of the way, running and snatching up his staff, throwing it in mid-run…

He did not get to see his throw succeed; Marissa lashed out with the Jabberwocky's tail and slammed it into Robin's side. He flew through the air like a rag doll, hitting the metal floor in a painful looking tumble before he came to a stop.

Marissa tried to get the machine to get up and turn around.

Robin got up. His whole expression screamed pain, but he got up.

The metal discs sprouted between his fingers a second later. One trick was good. More was better. Hurling each disc one after the other, Robin struck the final crystal dead on. Marissa cried out as it shattered, the whole room vanishing into the dark, save the light from her observation room.

Robin crotched down, trying to fight through the pain, even as he slid his mask to night vision. It was far from perfect, but in the dark, one thing about the machine stood out. Its batteries, and all the heat they produced. They were buried deep in the mech, but that meant that Robin could tell where it was at all times.

Marissa wanted to throw up. She'd failed. Without the lights, the Jabberwocky was only running on the power in its battery, which was still limited. It was why the Lord had arranged this setup in the first place…

But it was still fairly undamaged. Robin could not say the same. He couldn't punch the machine into submission, no matter WHO trained him. She had to do this. NOW!

The room lit up again as Marissa unleashed the flamethrower. Robin ran for it, shoving the pain in his side and other parts of his body into a box. He couldn't raise Raven, nor any of the other Titans. He was on his own.

Alone in the dark.

With the monster wanting to eat him.

…all in a night's work.

Marissa fought on with equal grim determination. She couldn't fail. She couldn't…

* * *

He'd failed.

Robin had put him in charge, trusted him to lead. He'd failed completely.

Cyborg didn't know how much Noel's betrayal (the Lord's betrayal, Cyborg knew on the surface, but his core refused to be convinced) had affected Tim, but he knew he hadn't let it affect how he handed out responsibility for this mission. Things had gone so that someone else had had to lead the team, and Cyborg had been tapped. Robin had put faith in him to do the right thing.

And he'd failed.

He'd failed the same way he had when he'd cursed out his father for saving his life, at the cost of becoming a cyborg. He'd let his selfish horror overcome his rational mind. His father had died mostly content, but Cyborg had always sensed a niggling fear from Silas Stone in his last moments that his son would end up hating his father even after he was gone. Maybe he'd been right.

Because the same thing had happened now. He'd let his selfish horror overcome his mind again. All those years of experience, of learning the shades of gray in the world, the machinations of inhuman villains…none of it had worked. He'd felt mortally betrayed, and let it affect him. Rigging Savior's gear. Being wary when he put his back to him. Not insisting to know what Savior had seen.

What he'd seen was now apparent, as was its cost. The smoke from the crater drifted all the way up to the clouds.

Despite already knowing the answer, Cyborg scanned. He could feel his teammates around him, staring in numb shock.

"Victor…" Starfire whispered.

Cyborg looked at the readings and shook his head.

"Wow. Guess he pissed the master off."

Torment floated down nearby, arms crossed.

"Is it sinking in YET? How outmatched you are? That this world was never yours, that it doesn't want you? That YOU belong in prison more than me? Idiots." Torment said. "You should have taken a knee. Instead you're just going to-"

Cyborg snapped up his sonic cannon. Torment sneered.

"Do what you keep doing. You stupid…"

The onomatopoeia of the sonic cannon was usually a dull growl at its loudest. Not this time. This time the cannon sounded like the howl of a wild beast…mainly because Victor had turned off all of the safety regulators.

It struck Torment's hand, and Torment, instead of casually blocking or deflecting it, reeled back in pain.

"WHAT THE FUCK?"

Morgue initially thought it was Beast Boy who made the second roar. As it turned out, it was Gauntlet, who punched Torment so hard it sounded like a thunder crack. Torment flew across the island like a bullet, Gauntlet scrambling after him as fast as he could go.

"Take. Him. DOWN." Cyborg said to everyone. "**HARD**."

Starfire said nothing, instead taking off like a blazing emerald fireball, all pain and exhaustion forgotten. Cyborg was right behind her, as was Beast Boy. Terra was a bit slower, having been staring at the crater the whole time.

"…gone." Terra said.

"Yes." Morgue replied, her tone neutral. Terra lowered her hand, clenching her fist.

"…not right." Terra said. She was, for the first time perhaps in her life, tasting the full bitter sting of hindsight bias, and how small it cast certain things. She'd hated Noel, she'd planned to leave the team and never have anything to do with him…and now he was dead. The last thing he'd done was protect her. His teammate.

"Not right…NOT…!" Terra said, and just what she was talking about remained unclear.

The ground beneath her exploded, Terra flying up and after them. Morgue watched a second, and then turned to Scalpel.

He was a contrast to all his remaining teammates, who had all become various shades of screaming, out of control rage. Scalpel, on the other hand, just looked…tired. Like he'd come to a bitter conclusion about the worth of some things, and found it gave him no answers or comfort.

"It seems like the island isn't tainted any more."

"Yeah."

Morgue said nothing, instead withdrawing a small book, producing a pen from somewhere and starting to write.

_Name: Noel Alexander Collins  
Age: 23  
Height: 6'3  
Weight: 232 pounds  
Religious Beliefs: Agnostic  
Attitude: Difficult  
Died: February 14th, 200X  
Cause of Death:…Murder_

"…we need to go." Sophie said, putting the book away.

"Let's." Scalpel said quietly, and the two followed in their teammates' wake. Torment had, by now, picked himself up, his arrogance now intermixed with rage.

"Oh what's THIS? Wasn't he the traitor, the bastard? Didn't half of you wanted to be rid of him? You got your wish! He died for you, threw you away! Or did you not realize ALL of you were supposed to be blown up?"

"BE SILENT!"

Starfire's piercing eye ray missed, flying into the distant horizon and who knows how much further.

"I will NOT!" Torment yelled back. "Goddamn liars! You wanted him gone! Now he's gone! You got what you wanted! FUCKING MORONS!"

The hands of rock ripped up from the ground, a pair of tank-sized fists smashing together on him and catching him completely off guard. Gauntlet leapt up, and instead of using an energy punch, he used an energy SPIKE, driving Torment into the ground and doing his best to shove him all the way to China. Torment fired his own eye-lasers, blasting Gauntlet away and floating up in time for Starfire to furiously attack him, her fists crashing against his arms like she was punching a padded wall rather than enchanted metal.

"Fine! I know what I want! What the master wants! And he wants you-!"

Beast Boy chomped onto Torment as a T-Rex, slammed him into the ground as he spit him out, and then stomped on him. Torment shoved him off and sat up to Morgue shooting him in the head, stunning him briefly as Scalpel closed in. Bats brought her _Dyson's Fear_, and when Torment pulled himself away from her boyfriend, she hit him with every bit of juice she had left.

* * *

Noel…

He had not been suicidal, that Raven knew. Despite his horrendous guilt, killing himself would have caused far more problems and solved none of the obvious ones. He'd done this…

Because it had been the right thing to do. How it had come to that, Raven did not know…but it was what her lover had chosen.

She hadn't known what she would do when this was all over. Maybe everything would have ended no matter what. But the choice had been taken from her, just like it had been taken from Noel. Like the Lord wanted to take it from the world.

She turned around, only for the Lord to have spoken in her ear to vanish. A shadow, like the kind that had greeted the Titans when they'd landed on the island. The real Lord was gone. The weight of it bore down on Raven.

Noel was gone. Gone in every way.

The Lord had fled.

He'd murdered the love of her life, and told her it was her fault. Then he'd run.

Raven felt her body expel the Fang shards she'd implanted in herself. She didn't care. She welcomed it.

She felt, in turn, the second pair of eyes open on her forehead. In their scarlet gaze, all became clear.

* * *

The difference between chess players and chess grandmasters was knowing sacrifice. Sometimes, to win, you had to give up your best pieces and put yourself at greater risk of losing, relying on your own skill to win the game.

So the Lord had made his decision, even as he ran frantically through the tunnels of Etemenanki. He knew what his actions were likely to prompt, and he'd done it anyway for the brief period of time it would buy him.

The ritual room. The shot that Raven had dodged, back when the fight had started, had not been an attack (though she'd nicely assumed that and sealed up the room behind her to prevent any kind of boomerang ambush). It had been a 'autopilot restart', a spell to pull the energies back together and recreate the situation the Lord had been in when Raven had interrupted him. Such a process did not require him save to step back in at the correct time and complete the ritual. That was now his only hope, especially for what he'd set in motion to get the time for it.

A wall split open, and the Lord leapt out of it, leaping across Etemenanki and crashing down against another tower. The Lord scrambled up its side at high speed (while cursing Raven's seals the whole time) before leaping off and crashing through another one of Etemenanki's walls. He was close now. He just had to get up to it.

Black mist steamed from the Lord's mouth as he sprinted onward. He should not feel this way. Feel like his running was causing him to exert effort. He had to reach the ritual room, he had to FINISH…Raven couldn't teleport either, or fly, and she didn't know the way around Etemenanki like he did. He had time if he used it properly…

The Lord then realized that, due to the design of the tower and his powers, he hadn't thought to include any stairs in _THIS _part. Or passageways that linked the floors. Cursing, he gathered his strength and then leapt upward, both blasting through the ceiling and crashing his body through it, expending more of what little remained of his strength. But he was almost there. Almost…

The last floor shattered around him, and the Lord found himself back where Raven had…

Sealed the room. Which the Lord promptly remembered when he ran into the wall and vicious arcs of dark energy blew him all the way across the room into the opposing one.

"Bitch!" The Lord cursed, pulling himself up and running back over. She'd done this protective spell in a few seconds, even at this level of power he should be able to unravel it. He opened up his sight to beyond the visual range and held out his hands, probing at the energies…

The explosion rocked the room, snapping the Lord out of his efforts as he whirled around, looking at the wall he'd just been thrown into it as it shattered. Impossible. She couldn't have followed him that fast! She couldn't teleport OR fly! She…

Still had her solar reliquary. Which had bonded to him, and he'd been unable to destroy. She'd cast a seeking spell and then just held onto the magical artifact as it flew in a straight line directly towards him, Raven smashing through the walls like they were nothing.

"_**RICHARDDDDDD…!"**_

Raven's humanity was as gone as her boyfriend. Her skin had become the color of blood, her hair in turn going stark white, turning from the thin strands humans had to the courser hair you found find on animals…and worse things. Four pairs of glowing red eyes, a different shade from her skin, threatened to burn a hole in him all by their lonesome, and from her head a crown of bone-like antler had sprouted, arcs of dark and bloody energies sparking between and off of it. Her wounds had vanished, though her outfit remained shredded…and from the shadows of said outfit, eyes seemed to peer. With Trigon dead, there was only one who could access his power, and she had finally fallen to the necessary depths to do so.

"…so then." The Lord said. "Welcome to MY world."

The Lord didn't have to resume trying to break apart Raven's seal. Raven did it for him, by blazing forward and smashing him directly through it and the wall beyond.

"I AM NOTHING LIKE YOU!" Raven roared, her voice shaking the whole room, holding the Lord up by his head with one black, gold, and sanguine energy arm before she began hammering clawing, crushing talons into his body, sending shattered and disintegrating pieces of shadow flying all over the room. "YOU ARE THE DEMON, NOT ME!"

Raven slammed the Lord into the ground before blasting him backwards into a wall and following after him. The Lord fired a blast, and Raven manifested a shield and flew directly through it, thrusting out her hands, her solar reliquary turning into golden spiked tendrils that she impaled into the Lord's chest, before she yanked him back into her and tore half his face off with a mad scream. The Lord stumbled back, and Raven manifested talons and began ripping into him again, tearing through shadow that felt more and more like flesh and bone.

"I WILL USE YOUR ESSENCE AS A TORCH FOR ETERNITY." Raven snarled, and seized the Lord before she detonated more power. The Lord flew back again, and Raven slashed out her arm. A blood-red arcing energy blade ripped through the Lord, and then another as Raven slashed out her other arm. Caught up in the twin-blades, Raven slashed her hands downward in an X and one final eruption of power blew the Lord into the ceiling before he crashed back down.

"No mercy. No end. WHAT YOU DESERVE." Raven rasped.

"…is that what he'd want?"

Raven shrieked and fired golden lines into the Lord, dragging him back to her as she tore his face off again with one clawing strike. The Lord recoiled, trying to get away, but Raven refused, dragging him back, even as barbed, thorned lines of darkness erupted from within her cloaks and impaled through the Lord. She felt his agony and drank it down. She'd drink until she was sick and then…

She had the Foreverwhere. She could do this for eternity. Gouge and never be full…

_Why use it for revenge? Why not use it for Noel?_

The thought hit Raven like a bomb. Behind it followed an even greater one.

IT HADN'T BEEN HER THOUGHT.

The Lord slashed out with his hand, catching Raven directly on the neck. Blood sprayed, and Raven recoiled, instantly breaking her connection to the Lord while cauterizing her wound closed…

Her blood.

The Lord had her blood.

"_And you…wonder what I want…Nothing…I have the blood of your father…"_

Trigon's blood, which she was of. Trigon's power, which she'd claimed. The Lord had used it as a lynchpin for his first ritual…

…AND HE'D JUST ARRANGED TO GET IT AGAIN.

"Thank you." The Lord said, and promptly hammered the mental images of Noel's death into Raven's head, driving her back once again before he slammed his hand down against the ground.

The sigils and runes alit across the entire chamber, finally called back into view again. Had she not been able to find him, the Lord would have needed to take several minutes to arrange the energies needed to do what he'd needed to do.

With Trigon's blood, and the energies within it, the same energies he'd used in his first ritual so long ago, he could skip right to the end.

Just as he planned in his attempt to kill her friends and making her become this. Around the Lord, a final, brand new set appeared.

"_**ASHANEFONAI BARSHAI-KAH!"**_

"NO!" Raven yelled, throwing out a hand. The Lord ignored her, turning around as the wounded air appeared behind him again, and with one final dramatic gesture, he thrust out both arms and lashed them out in a 180 degree clawing gesture.

Down below, deep in the depths of Etemenanki, the shriek of unfathomable agony ripped up through the tower spires, a cry from the very depths of hell.

The air tore open, and the energies within it erupted, driving Raven back. The full truth of it slammed into her a second later, causing her second set of eyes to vanish and her skin to begin to pale. She'd been played. After all she'd done to control the board, she'd ended up one move behind. Because she was unwilling to sacrifices her pieces, while the Lord was.

"…..heh…heh heh heh heh HA HA HA HA HA! Shah-mat. The king is dead." The Lord said, turning back around. "LONG LIVE THE KING."

Behind the Lord lay a void of impossible, perfect white.

White that surged out in tiny droplets, impossibly beautiful snowflakes, and settled onto the Lord. Absorbed into him.

His body repaired. His cloaks re-manifested. His eyes went from human to the void within him. Within seconds, the efforts Raven and her friends had expended were all rendered moot.

Her failure was complete.

Raven watched…and then her own eyes went red once more. The blood came back to her skin. The second set of eyes return.

"YOU. WILL. DIE. TODAY." Raven said. Humanity and survival had ceased to have any meaning to her. All that mattered was revenge.

The Lord smirked inwardly. Now she saw the truth. When everything was said and done…she was just. Like. Him.

But his world had no need for a devil.

"So you wish." The Lord said. "I have mine. Come, Raven of Azaroth. Come avenge your loss. If you can. For I am the Lord."

With one hand, the Lord gestured at her.

Raven's solar reliquary tore from her hand, flying into the Lord's own.

"_YOUR _God."

With one swift gesture, he crushed it.

The light that exploded from the artifact vaporized the Lord down to a skeleton of shadow. The Lord completely ignored this fact even as his body immediately reformed, the shadows sliding over the 'bones' and reforming into cloaks, a few pieces of broken shadow falling onto the ground around him. Like a snake shedding its skin.

Or a darkness god completely breaking all the seals Raven had worked so hard to place on her. The Lord smiled impossibly wide, white sparks crackling in the void of his gaze.

"I am the light and the way."

Raven shrieked and flew forward.

"_**REJOICE."**_

* * *

On the battlefield, the jacket drifted on one final breeze.

Then the point of the spire broke through the weakened material, and the jacket slumped down and dissolved, a chain reaction that had finally come to pass, the material breaking apart on a molecular level and vanishing on the wind.

Here no longer.

* * *

"It is not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbled, or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes short again and again, who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, and spends himself in a worthy cause, who at best knows achievement and who at the worst if he fails at least fails while daring greatly so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat."

_-_-**Teddy Roosevelt**


	7. Drops of Jupiter

Chapter 7: Drops Of Jupiter

"We watched our friends grow up together

And we watched them as they fell

Some of them fell into heaven

Some of them fell into hell."

-The Pogues, _A Rainy Night In Soho_

* * *

"_You say you wrong, you wrong, I'm right, I'm right, you're wrong, we fight_

_Ok, I'm running from the light, running from the day to night_

_Oh, the quiet silence defines our misery_

_The riot inside keeps trying to visit me_

_No matter how we try, it's too much history_

_Too many bad notes playing in our symphony_

_So let it breathe, let it fly, let it go_

_Let it fall, let it crash, burn slow_

_And then you call upon God_

_Ohhh, You call upon God…"_

_**There is an old turn of phrase…'it seemed like a good idea at the time'.**_

_**Perhaps no one can escape it. Caesar declared himself emperor. Henry VIII formed his own religion. Hitler attacked the Soviet Union. History proved the terrible error of such decisions, but at the time, the makers surely thought they were wise.**_

…_**Perhaps I made them not because I share the same flaws, but because I am far better equipped to recover from them. Learn from them. Knowledge is power, and some knowledge is hard come by.**_

_**It seems like the way of the world that once-believed obvious choices bring the hardest lessons…**_

_Jump City's primary cemetery was well-kept, with constantly tended grounds and a decent stone wall surrounding it. It also possessed a full-time groundskeeper and part-time watchman who kept an eye on the place._

_Marissa Mori would have been worried sick about such things. Zia Mori was not the slightest bit concerned; the aforementioned people were currently asleep. Nor was she worried (in a sense) about being noticed. She had managed to retrieve some jeans and a light, dark-colored sweater from the Salvation Army, as well as dark purple sneakers (which were a touch snug, but she'd had worse). It was enough to keep her decently blended in with the shadows…_

_If the shadows didn't bend themselves to the whim of the creature before her._

_It was hard to process. It was not as if the cat that she followed emitted light so she could see, so much as it violently shoved the darkness away so her eyes were not affected by it. Zia had long stopped asking questions about how the cat did these things. It was not normal, that she knew, and it was her sworn guardian in exchange for her service. In this case, her service had been bringing along a stolen bolt-cutter to break through the chains on the front gate, the black cat having had to devote his unnatural energies 'elsewhere' and leaving the task to her. With her task done, she followed, wanting to see what would happen. Marissa would have been terrified and probably stayed where she was like a statue after breaking through the locks, but Zia had no such desire. Forget the strangeness of the cat; she had questions and wanted answers._

"_Tell me, Miss Mori…have you ever heard of the fae?"_

_Zia narrowed her eyes. She had very strong suspicions, one that she was close to deciding upon entirely, that the cat had some sort of greater perception than it let on. That question hit just a little too close to home to her private thoughts. For now, she'd let it pass. Until she COULD form a complete decision._

"_You mean fairies?"_

"_Yes, technically…"_

"_Well, this world has morons who can build working jet packs and not die in ten seconds, so…that doesn't mean jack shit. What's your point? And don't tell me YOU'RE one."_

"_No…no I'm not. But your doubt is incorrect, Miss Mori. They do exist. In fact, it's said that Shakespeare wrote A Midsummer Night's Dream for them, and performed it for the real Oberon and Titania. And even if that's just a story…the fae are real. To mortals, they can hide so well they may as well just be fiction…but…there are always exceptions."_

"_And what does that have to do with aping Frankenstein?" Zia part asked and part sneered._

"_Down the close and up the stair, but and ben wi' Burke and Hare; Burke's the butcher, Hare's the thief, Knox the man who buys the beef."_

"…_WHAT?"_

"_Oh, sorry. That was probably a little over your head." The cat said._

"_Whatever. I assume we're here to dig something up. What does that have to do with fairies?"_

"_Because they're part of a very interesting lineage." The cat said, as he came to a stop before two graves. Zia squinted at them, wishing for a flashlight._

**ADAM ALEXANDER MATTHEWS**

**1982-2001**

**An errant soul, that now has peace**

**AURA MATTHEWS**

**1990-2001**

**Beloved sister, innocent girl,**

**sleeps before her time**

"_It's funny. Even today, with communication as advanced as it's become, and superheroes at the pinnacle of exposure along with celebrities, there are stories that still slip through the cracks." The cat said. "So happened this little tale, of two unique children, an amoral mercenary king who desired something, and the child heroes who were caught in the middle. The end result is two corpses. What a waste of good material."_

"…_why?"_

"_Because these corpses aren't human. They're a merge of both a fae and a demonic lineage." The cat said, turning back towards Zia, a glint of red briefly flashing in one of its eyes. "Chaotic energies flow in oceans through their veins…or could have, if things had not been so tragically cut short. But I am not one to waste good material."_

"_Hardly good now." Zia said, glancing at the date on her secondhand watch. "In fact I'm pretty sure there won't be anything left except bones and worms."_

"_And that's why you open the doors." The cat said. "There are many forces that pass through this world, Miss Mori. They don't all fall under the same concepts of entropy."_

_The cat was sinking into the ground, Zia realized. It wasn't like quicksand; instead the cat just seemed to be ignoring the fact he was standing on solid dirt and had started moving downwards through sheer force of denial._

"_Wait here. This should not take long." The cat said, and smiled. The smile remained against the dark grass for a moment as the head vanished beneath it, before fading away to nothing._

"_Don't start calling me Alice." Zia said, and waited. A unknown amount of time later, the Lord returned._

"_It's done." The Lord said. "Things aren't quite right yet…but I've laid the framework. When the proper time comes, I will return. Things will be set in motion. The Titans will have no idea what hit them."_

"_So why did you need me then, Cat?" Zia said, clearly agitated. Her skills were in scientific arts, of knowing how to manipulate bodies and minds via perception tricks and 'biological exploits'. To her, once someone was dead, they were rotting meat turning to dust and nothing more. The concept of that not always being the case, defined by a set of laws and systems she couldn't even begin to wrap her head around, bothered her immensely._

"_Someone had to open the door." The cat said. He did not specify why such a thing was needed. It wouldn't do if the resentful psychopath knew that graveyards held their own special powers if properly crafted, and that as weak as he was, trying to force his way onto such a place would be like a more traditional undead walking on consecrated ground; nothing good would result. But if a living mortal opened the way, then all such powers fell by the wayside, provided you didn't do something stupidly overt to trigger them. And the Lord was not stupid._

"_Whatever." Zia said, speeding up her walking pace. She was somewhat surprised when she reached the gateway and did not find the cat waiting for her. It loved to do that._

_Three seconds after she stepped through, it was sitting on her shoulder, balanced perfectly. Balanced like no living creature could possibly replicate._

"_As for my eventual plan, Miss Mori, well…don't go to weep upon my grave, and think that there I'll be; They haven't left an atom there, of my anatomie."_

_Zia said nothing, heading off down the dark sidewalk. Though she made a mental note that if the cat spoke again, she would offer him a cracker._

_**A good idea…**_

_**Still was, in a way. Despite some errors in assessing genealogy. Despite how it played out…despite it all.**_

_**It taught me to make sure that before you tried anything, to make sure you controlled all the variables. To account for everything. If you don't…**_

_**Well, you saw what happened.**_

_**Chaos touches all things. How deep the touch reaches is entirely up to the tasks and powers of Order. Chaos, when used improperly…backfires. Often quite badly.**_

_**But when used PROPERLY…**_

_**Nothing stands before it.**_

_**Not a well-structured plan.**_

_**Not a sense of self-preservation.**_

_**Not anything. Including death itself.**_

_**Or a girl's whole life goal.**_

_**All possibilities of direction and discord are soon to be within my grasp.**_

_**In the hand that will choke the life from my enemies.**_

* * *

Raven's skills as a sorceress had been proven that day…but even a prodigy can make mistakes.

The defenses on the T-Tower had never been anything to sneeze at, and had become more and more formidable over the years (barring Cyborg's hand print scanner glitches, but those had never caused anything more serious than the Titan threatening to blow a blood vessel in frustration of being unable to permanently rid his security systems of that particular bug). Raven had played a hand in the structuring of these defenses, adding her magical efforts to Cyborg's, Robin's, Savior's, Scalpel's, and Morgue's technological and tactical construction. Any dark forces that deemed it necessary to attack the home of the young heroes would find themselves being stopped cold…

In theory. In reality, while the defenses were well structured, they were not without holes. Specifically, that the defenses functioned a lot better with Raven there to modify them than on autopilot. Without her, the protective barriers and other magical armaments were only as useful if they could find a target. If the target could make its way in without being detected…

As badly as the Lord had underestimated Raven, THAT assessment of her abilities had been dead on.

And so, Ryce was now dead to the world.

Blood ran down from the maid's forehead, staining into her blonde hair and dripping off her cheek where she lay, sprawled over a shattered chair. The Abhorred sent to deal with her paid her no attention, a necklace dangling from its hand as it made its way over to the Titans' main computers.

Another weakness in the defenses; the magical ones were designed to recognize enemies if/when they approached and keep them out. If the initial recognition was bypassed, they had no ability to target foes _inside _the defenses unless Raven directed them too. The mechanical defenses COULD…but without any pointers from the magical defenses, they couldn't detect the Abhorred at all.

Or realize that when they were being triggered to seal someone into a room, the order wasn't being given by one of the Titans. Considering the Titans had rarely ever left the Tower with just one person in it, especially when that person had never liked trying to learn all the complicated ins and outs of their security and hence didn't, it was an understandable oversight.

One that was about to cost them dear. With the wave of its arm, the Abhorred fired off glass-like projectiles that sliced into the systems before it, the alarms briefly activating before they became discordant and muffled, like the attack was somehow strangling them. The computers attempted to respond to the invasion and quickly discovered firewalls and off the grid redundant systems meant nothing to black magic. Within five seconds, every single communication device within the tower was either toast or scrambled so badly it might have well have been destroyed. Sparks and electrical arcs erupted from the computer, but the Abhorred paid it no attention, turning and sprinting towards the nearest window.

The spells laid over them, as mentioned, were designed to keep things out. Something GOING out was just confusing enough for the Abhorred to slip through with minimal harm. A few seconds later, armored shutters cranked down over the windows, sealing the Tower up like a drum.

The Abhorred sprinted to the water and dove in, going as deep into the water as it could, fleeing from the sunlight before the clouds overhead could pass by. Once it had reached deeper, darker depths, it took off at a speed that would have made Orin of Atlantis turn his head.

Mission accomplished. The Lord may have lost a considerable amount of pieces on his board, but it was rapidly becoming clear that it might have just been the chaff being separated from the wheat.

* * *

Terra had thought she was tired.

The whole fight had been a test in frustration for her. It was one thing to train for mission possibilities where there would be no rock, like on a spaceship. It was another to feel the ground beneath your feet and know that it might as well have been on another planet. Having to fight such numerous and powerful foes, all the while only able to rely on some small personal ordnance or devoting extra time and/or effort to pull rock from the ocean floor…she'd felt taxed and drained. Part of her had even considered holding back when they finally confronted and finished shredding the Lord. Let her teammates 'project', she'd known who she was going to blame…

Then Noel had been killed. Murdered. Had he not done what he'd done, she might have died as well. If she, if her team, hadn't made the choices she had…maybe he wouldn't have had to die. He'd made his choice…but he'd had to work with what he had been given.

And what he'd been given, in the end…hadn't been right. She'd hated him for murdering them…except if he was really, solely, all to blame, why'd he do what he did?

Why had it taken her what he did to really realize that?

Except she knew why. She knew.

She'd been weak. No one had said she ever had to work with Noel again when this was all said and done, but she'd salved her own pain by indulging in black, unrelenting hate. Now someone was dead because of it. Her whole life as a Titan, she'd been taught to control herself, keep herself in check so innocents did not die. Noel was not innocent, but neither was he fully to blame. She'd failed not just him, but her teammates. She'd failed herself.

She should have been better.

Worse, she suspected that unlike Noel, she really had no one else to blame.

Anger. The rage was back, tempered by already-exerted effort. She would not fail again. Now she could do what she did best.

Rock.

Rolling was optional. Terra rose instead, ripping the ground up from beneath her feet, more stone following up behind her and merging with her platform, Terra compacting the volcanic granite even as she broke it down to its base components and forged it into a giant spear. Her eyes shone gold, and she lanced forward like she was shot from a bow, aiming herself directly towards Torment as he drove Scalpel and Morgue off with gatling-gun fire.

Inside a half second, the Genocide member had converted his arm back and grabbed at the spear with both hands, stopping its point a few inches from his chest. Terra's eyes blazed, the rock spear trembling as she urged it forward. It trembled, but remained still. Terra snarled and thrust out a hand, golden sparks flying from her fingers. Her spear still remained where it was, stopped completely dead by Torment's hands.

"Funny how weak hypocrisy is, isn't it?" Torment sneered. "What's pissing you off so much, girl? That you were a shallow, vindictive bitch, or that with your traitor dead, all his crimes get wiped clean and YOU get blamed for not forgiving his crimes earlier?"

"Actually…just testing your peripheral vision." Terra snarled back. Her rock exploded, and the geokinetic whipped out one arm and grabbed one of the pieces of stone, the shrapnel/handpiece pulling her backwards at high speed. Torment saw the giant shadow fall over him, and turned around as the 150 cubic feet Terra had ripped out of La Voix folded over and crashed down onto Torment with a destructive roar, Terra hitting the ground and using her talent to aid in her momentum-slowing roll.

"IT SUCKS, BY THE WAY!" Terra yelled, and slammed her hand down, grinding the mass of earth into the island.

The backlash slammed into her head, and Terra recoiled even as Torment punched his way out from beneath her giant stone, crimson and gold energies slashing across his body.

"So do you."

Gauntlet slammed the spinning, drilling energy-fist into Torment, having wound up for nearly ten seconds before he punched. Torment…blocked it with one arm, kinetic sparks erupting from his arm and body as the power ripped and tore at him, his feet ripping grooves into the top of Terra's rock as the blow pushed him backwards.

"…nice degree of force." Torment said, the spires extending from his back around his other, free arm. "Now why don't you ride the lightning!"

The black arcs of electricity surged towards Gauntlet, the Titan retracting his drill-punch and turning it into a shield, the stone around him burning to ash as he tried to defend himself. Torment kept up the pressure, shaking the arm Gauntlet's punch had struck as he did, like he was relieving a stiff muscle.

Cyborg's sonic blast struck him in the back. Torment stumbled forward a step, turning around.

"Problem with those unleashed shots…make a heck of a lot of noise." Torment said, and slashed out his hand, deflecting a Starbolt into the distance. "Another problem, as mad as you are. Doesn't change that you're running out of gas."

"So are you." Cyborg snarled.

"You'll tank first."

Starfire's hands blazed, and she promptly hurled another Starbolt…at Cyborg. The Titan's mechanical arm opened up, the blast of solar power flying into the limb. It immediately snapped closed, shifted, and then fired a carving blue and green ray through the air that Cyborg raked across Torment's front. Torment strangely did not yell, instead staggering back and briefly falling to one knee, the metal in front of him sheared open.

"…ow…"

Torment pushed himself back up, darkness drawing the metal back together. It wasn't quite regeneration, but it made the wound less exploitable.

"….every trick you pull…is one the master then knows. And even now…you can't bring yourself to kill me. There's just too much saint in your blood, Titans."

Gauntlet punched Torment in the back. Torment barely seemed to notice.

"…not good enough…never good enough…I am the alpha and the omega…" Torment said.

The fired grenade exploded a few feet from Torment, the spray of taser darts impaling themselves in his chest, all of them overloading to subject him to as much raw voltage as possible.

"And you're going to need beta blockers." Morgue said. The electricity cut off a second later;Torment smiled at the undertaker through a pall of thin smoke, and then went for her. Starfire and Scalpel immediately ambushed him, pounding away.

"Leave it to Sophie to make the references I need to grab a book to understand." Terra commented, floating next to Gauntlet, having needed a bit to recover from her last attack, and how it had been powered through.

"…we've lost." Gauntlet said.

"What?" Terra said, looking at her fellow Titan.

"All this, we…we've already lost. Even if we win…what's going to be left? And he…he said it himself. Everything we did…the Lord probably got to see…and…this isn't how it's supposed to happen. We're the HEROES…Noel's dead…Noel's dead and Torment just won't STAY DOWN…"

"…NO! No, NO, Rob! You are NOT going ga-ga like this! Not YOU! Snap out of it!" Terra said, floating over in front of Gauntlet. "You heard Cyborg! He's a liar, he's faking it! I just dropped a few thousand tons on him, he HAS to be running low! For crying out loud…MY POWERS ARE WORKING AGAIN! WE CAN WIN THIS! WE WILL!"

"Even if we beat Torment…"

"Fuck Torment. Fuck the Lord. This is NOT YOU, Rob." Terra said, stabbing Gauntlet in the chest with a finger.

"…I saw the blast, he…"

"…yeah. And I would have probably been too confused for Noel to do anything else but what he did. And…well, yeah. He punched through your shield. I got nothing there. I thought you handled that by getting mad and planning to get even."

"There's no way we can BREAK even…we…"

"Gauntlet. You listen." Terra said. "You remember what you told me, all those years ago? That running off based on a snap judgment was a stupid cliché? What do you think having an angst crisis in the middle of the biggest fight of our lives is? ESPECIALLY for YOU? Yeah, Noel's dead…we're still superheroes! WITH ALL THAT ENTAILS! REMEMBER IT, BLONDIE! YOU BORED ME ENOUGH WITH IT!"

"…you're right." Gauntlet said.

"Well, yeah, of course I am."

"He can cheat as much as he likes, but I'm not letting THIS be the guy who takes us down! Slade, maybe. He'd have earned it. The Anti-Monitor? Better than us died back then. But this freaking puissant? No way in he-!"

The glaive flew through the air. Gauntlet's eyes widened again.

Terra's eyes flashed, and a shelf of rock erupted from behind her. The glaive buried itself in the stone, stopping it cold.

"…like I said, Gauntlet. You taught me much about cliché." Terra said, turning around to look at Torment. The Genocide member had tried to use his magnetic blaster to stab her in the back, and she was eager to return the favor. "YOU DROPPED THIS!"

The rock flew back towards Torment. He shattered it with a punch, which let Starfire swoop in and bury him into the ground once more. With another stomp, Terra made the small crater he'd made close on him like a mouth. When he ripped himself free, Scalpel met him with the glaive and sent him tumbling backwards.

"You've learned well, my young padawan."

"Let's have some amok time!"

"Ugh!"

"What? …Oh right, that's Star _TREK _isn't…forget it! Cyborg, how much does he have left?" Terra asked into her communicator.

"Well, no promises but…not much! I think! Forget any readings, I believe that in my gut!" Cyborg responded.

"You don't have a lot of gut left…" Gauntlet said. Terra flicked her eyes over, noting the returning chord of worry in Gauntlet's voice.

"…Rob, Star and Cy made a hole in his chest, even closed…you don't have to worry about your power being cut. Think you can try and pry yourself under his armor and disable something? Or at least give him an Indian burn?"

"Do we know if he has…"

The top quarter of Etemenanki exploded so suddenly and violently that, in between his recoiling and settling into a defensive pose, Gauntlet wondered if the JLA had somehow been alerted to the Lord's plot and fired their satellite weapon at him.

The second thing that Gauntlet noticed was that the rest of the twisting citadel rapidly caught on fire, even as two streaking forms, one red, one black, flew overhead, crashing against each other a few times…

The final impact smashed the red streak into the ground a few miles distant, the black one continuing its outward flight over the Atlantic ocean. Gauntlet and Terra, with their fight taking place on a raised part of the island, got a decent viewpoint of it all as it played out.

"…what the heck just happened?" Gauntlet said.

"You're asking ME? The fuck? Why is Raven red?" Terra said.

"That's Raven?"

"Who else would it be, frick'n Captain Marvel?"

The black energy shot from the far-distant dark figure, but Gauntlet only noticed it for a second, as Raven's howl of enraged anguish washed over his ears. Blood-red energy and fire erupted from her distant form, spires of crimson rage, the ground burning away beneath her in a radius that hit fifty feet, a hundred, five hundred, and beyond. A moment later, the clouds above Raven began to spiral like a hurricane, their color transforming from piteous murk to burning rufescent, the skyline turning to hell.

"…is it possible for a no-win situation to actually get WORSE? Or where we already there?" Gauntlet said.

A second later, the red figure was up in the air, several hundred feet away from the black form. A second after THAT, scarlet and midnight energies bloomed into existence between them, the two forces growing into two tidal waves of power surging against each other before they exploded. Waves of horrendous force buffeted the island, the ocean roaring up and crashing against the shore, devouring pieces of it beneath its churning maw. When Gauntlet finally managed to look again, the two figures were gone.

"…ha ha ha…yes, Robert Candide."

Gauntlet turned to the voice. Torment's voice. He was floating nearby…

Holding the black energy the dark form had tossed before Raven's wrath had transformed the skies and seas. The second Gauntlet looked, he crushed it in his hand.

Starfire's Starbolt, clearly aimed to stop this action, arrived a second too late. Torment grabbed it in turn…

The energy vanished, but in the wrong way. It did not seemed to be scattered, just…

Absorbed.

Gauntlet's mouth went dry, and Torment threw back his head and laughed, holding both arms out as green energies, their color sickly and morbid to Starfire's bright and vibrant, manifested.

"YES! YES, IT CAN!" Torment laughed, glorying in the power the Lord had fed into his personal reliquary, the same one that had absorbed Raven's power and set the events of the last half hour in motion. "THE MASTER RISES! THE BLACKBIRD FALLS! AND IT IS GLORIOUS!"

Gauntlet could only stare, even as the cold numbness of despair began to seep back into him, Torment laughing insanely all the while.

"…Gauntlet?" Terra said. "…how do you know when an idea is too crazy to work?"

"…trial and error, mostly." Gauntlet replied, in a fashion that suggested an instinctive response rather than any direct thought.

"…we're done with error." Terra said. "But…I think we're about to have a LOT of trial."

"Then let's go file some briefs."

"Huh?" Terra said.

"It was either that or a joke about a gavel."

"Should have gone with the gavel." Beast Boy said, popping up next to the pair. "It's a silly word."

"Duly noted."

* * *

"Glory in my magnificence later, Weames. Invoke my divine mandates instead." The Lord said, before he turned to look at a blank spot, the black magical disc crackling under his feet. He'd thrown off all of Raven's sealing spells for the most part, but the damn two-part one that had kept him from teleporting or flying had been persistent. He could teleport again, but even in the chaos of battle his flying had been rocky; half the time it had been more carefully directed momentum combined with magical mass reduction than defying gravity. Not to worry, though; with the power of the Foreverwhere, he had options even if he couldn't shake it off.

There were bigger concerns now. Even for him.

Raven's new teleportation, rather than a smooth emergence, was more akin to a rupturing of the air, Raven's appearing demonic countenance blazing even fiercer than the hellfire she'd left on his fortress.

"_**REJOICE."**_

_The nails on Raven's hand did not so much extend and sharpen as they CONTORTED into blades, like the flesh in the digits was being forcibly twisted into its new shape. Said blades stopped a few inches from the Lord's eyes, the shadow god grabbing his enemy's wrist. Fire exploded behind him in multiple lines, the unholy energy burning on the stone/crystal makeup of the inner walls of Etemenanki despite lacking any fuel or grip._

"…_thou I shall walk in the valley of the shadow of death, I shall fear no evil." The Lord said._

_Raven opened her mouth and exhaled, summoning the unfathomable chill of Cocytus and bringing it to bear against the Lord. The profane ice engulfed the Lord, locking his form into a statue that Raven closed her hands around, crushing the Lord's head between them. Surging back, Raven ripped a crystal from the wall and held it out, the gemstone converting to metal in her hand before she hurled it at the Lord. At the same time, dark energy bloomed around him, and the silver projectile spawned a mass of clones that flew into the Lord from all angles, shattering his body to dust._

_Said dust immediately surged forward in turn. Raven threw up a shield, only for the dust to rip right through it and slam Raven into the wall, the rending fragments dragging her along its length before it hurled her across the room. The shadows and dust spiraled back together, reforming into the Lord._

"_My cup runneth over." The Lord said, holding out a hand, even as more glittering snowflakes flew from the Foreverwhere rift to him. "Surely goodness and mercy will follow me…"_

_Raven blazed forward again, her four eyes lighting up and blasting blood-red energy towards the Lord. He countered it with his own ocular blast, the walls beginning to crack open across the room._

"…_There are various eyes. Even the Sphinx has eyes: and as a result there are various truths, and as a result, THERE IS NO TRUTH." The Lord said. "You know that well, Raven. If you didn't before…"_

_Raven's hands contorted, and then with a twisting yank, the demonically-empowered sorceress turned away from the Lord and cast a cage of red energies over the impossibly-white schism in the air. The Lord shut off his own blast, staring at this for a few moments._

_His grin, when it crossed his face, was borderline feral._

"_Very GOOD, Raven of Azaroth…except you're not of there any more, are you?" The Lord said. "But even with your father's legacy in full bloom, you refuse to allow it full **control**. I suspect it's the same reason you don't try and tap the Foreverwhere yourself. The devil you know…not like it matters. In the last analysis, even the best man is evil: in the last analysis, even the best woman is bad. ACCEPT IT, BLACKBIRD. YOU'VE ALREADY LOST."_

_Raven would have told him she hadn't lost as long as the Lord still had things she could take from him. Instead she just screamed, and the room dissolved in endless hellfire that ultimately consumed the structure entirely._

Her anger had only grown from there. It had written itself on the world. Their own special wonderland. The Lord allowed himself a brief smirk.

"How fine you look when dressed in rage. And you're lucky too. Red eyes suit so few."

Raven blasted towards the Lord, the shadow god flying away on his disc. Raven whirled around, her hands out, vermillion power gathering before her. The Lord thrust out his own hand, pointing one finger as a sphere of darkness manifested in turn. The attacks collided, and again _La Voix _was rocked by the power of the beings above it, the seas boiling and the clouds churning in the grip of unfathomable ire.

The Lord crashed down onto one of the distant ends of the island, having rode out the shockwaves to land on his feet. He looked at the burning inferno in the air, marveling in its intensity, before holding out a hand. A blade of energy manifested, forming a generic crystalline sword rather than any specific design. Why lock oneself in to the established designs of man when you could comprehend the purity of forms?

The inferno's death was abrupt, the flames and darkness contorting inwards and being consumed by Raven's form. The Lord smirked again, before he blasted himself up towards her. Dark impacts rang across the sky, before the two reformed half a mile away, Raven's black and red energies holding back the Lord's own dark blade.

"Come, Raven…hellfire, matter transmutation, obliteration ocular beams…your father has so many interesting traits! Why go back to this boring routine?" The Lord said.

Raven's eyes sparked, and her power became infused with fire, exploding out around her…

Before she teleported behind the Lord.

"IT SUITS YOU."

Raven unleashed another, even more massive blast of power and fire as she spoke, pinning the Lord between the two before they exploded. Again, he tumbled to the ground, smashing through a giant boulder before he flipped over to his feet.

"Then again…there is SOMETHING to be said for classics!" The Lord said, snapping out his hand. The ground around his feet shattered as he fired the blast, said blast expanding into a destructive cone that sought to engulf Raven.

Raven held out her own hand, dark energies firing into the blast, and as it closed in she deflected it with one wave of her arm, the attack breaking apart and disappearing. The Lord smirked yet again.

Then he punched the ground. La Voix contorted, and from various parts of the island stone towers blasted upward, their tops glowing with red sigils. Raven slammed her hands together, teleporting away…

Except the towers did not attack. Raven re-appeared only to find the Lord leaping up in front of her, having detected her teleportation path and moved to intercept.

"And basics."

The Lord kicked Raven as hard as he could, the Titan flying through several of the stone pillars with explosive impact, before the Lord outpaced her momentum and met her with another kick, Raven snapping in another direction before the Lord blurred over again and kicked her high into the sky. Teleporting up after her, the Lord lashed out with his form-blade, the energy slicing across Raven's body and sending her flying back towards the ground like a meteor, impacting and impaling her body in the top of one of the Lord's summoned feint-towers. Manifesting his own claws on his free hand, the Lord followed her down.

Just like him, she caught his wrist before he made contact, stopping the Lord dead. Something he had clearly not thought was possible.

"This…is what you offer me…in defiance?" Raven snarled. "DON'T MAKE ME LAUGH."

Raven promptly clawed the Lord in turn, the impact shattering the tower behind her and sending the Lord crashing down into the ground. Raven directed several spheres of hellfire down after him, the Lord vanishing in a pillar of flame.

Before he promptly appeared on top of another stone bastion, looking none the worse for wear.

"Arrogance on the part of the meritorious is even more offensive to us than the arrogance of those without merit: for merit itself is offensive." The Lord said, and drew his form-blade over his wrist, spraying out black blood that formed into new Abhorred. "Let's see if wrath can turn back my craftsmanship as easily as wile."

The shadow-entities sprouted weapons and leapt for Raven, some of them running across the air instead. Raven's eyes blazed, and she unleashed another blast of eye beams, carving several of the shadows in half before she incinerated the rest. For the two that got close to her, her cloaks flared open to produce razor-jaws of her own shadows, ripping them apart into mist. Raven turned her eyes back to the Lord…

To find him still on the stone tower. With nearly a hundred Abhorred. As her eyes fixed on him, he sprayed out more of his 'blood', creating another score.

"Another difference. Unlike last time, I recall that I can KEEP DOING THIS." The Lord said. "Thus is the reign of God: as if a man may cast the seed on the earth."

Raven blasted another stream of hellfire at the Lord. The Lord deflected it, even as the new masses of Abhorred came for her. Raven flew backwards, her cloaks wrapping around herself.

Red hands erupted from her, grabbing onto various Abhorred and dragging them in, before the sorceress and the Lord's creations vanished in one gigantic eruption of crimson light.

The Lord cocked his head.

"You set…your aberrations against me…and I turn them…to the image…of what I find aberrant…in the family you seek to harm…" Raven said. The Abhorred were gone. Instead, around Raven were the Titans…except not. All color had been drained from them, all variance, all vitality. All that remained was naked aggression and rage, all of which was directed at the Lord.

"…clever girl." The Lord said, and raised his blade as the shadow-Titans leapt in in turn.

Then Raven was beside him. The Lord immediately moved to intercept, slashing out with his sword.

It went right through Raven, her image breaking apart. An illusion. She'd faked him out.

"_CLEVER GIRL." _The Lord snarled, and then the shadow-Titans dogpiled him.

* * *

Something had gone terribly wrong. Robin felt it in his bones.

Just what, he couldn't say, and he wasn't in a situation to get on his communicator and inquire. He'd tried thinking 'towards' Raven again, but he'd gotten no answer. Between those two facts, Robin found himself staring down an inward wall of dread.

He did what he had to do with it. He processed it, compartmentalized it, and stuck it away in a corner of his mind.

It was best. Batman had trained him in more than just combat and criminal science. They'd practiced disaster scenarios ranging from traditional earthquakes and city-wide fires to unconventional incidents, like a mass release of Scarecrow's fear gas, or the sewers filling with acidic sludge, or the barriers between reality ripping open and spilling out creatures from beyond the veil that human beings couldn't look upon without dying. The main lesson threaded through each situation was the harshest, cruelest lesson any superhero could, or had to, or resisted learning. You can't save everyone. In fact, you may have to settle for saving one, or even just your own life, while the rest die around you. Trying to defy this chilling possibility could very well result in your own death, which meant that the people you could have saved in the future would now also be doomed. This fact went double for your companions. In disaster scenarios, beneath the teamwork and protection, you had to accept there might be a time that you couldn't change anything and that you had to trust your teammates to succeed while you worked on whatever lay in front of you.

So Robin didn't contact Cyborg. If he did, and he learned if something had went wrong, if things had gone terribly…it wouldn't do a damn thing to change that he was locked in this room with a giant war machine that could still very easily kill him, and that even if he got out, he'd still be worn out and out of toys, facing the Titans' most powerful persistent enemy.

He had to deal with the problem ahead of him first. He'd done well so far, knocking out the lights, giving him the visual advantage. He had to keep pressing, which was another reason he hadn't contacted Cyborg. He had to save his breath for what he was about to do.

"Where's Zia, Marissa?"

There was no answer. Robin hadn't expected one, and he could tell from the particular silence that it wasn't because Marissa was being tactically quiet.

"If Zia was around, she'd have taken over. I mean, I'm still alive, in this darkness that you clearly weren't ready for? She'd be out and cursing my name." Robin said. Despite his claim, he was taking no chances on whatever night-vision the Jabberwocky might have, carefully creeping around the darkness while doing every trick he'd learned to throw/obscure his voice. True, if the Jabberwocky had some kind of sonar-like device, that kind of effort would likely be for naught, but the fact that Marissa was still moving the machine around in searching movements was a good sign.

"I suppose you could claim the Lord fixed you…except I've seen nothing but fear, Marissa. Before, even at your worst, you were never this afraid. Never this WEAK. Zia would have come out long before now…if she wasn't gone. She's gone, isn't she? What did the Lord do? Did he seal her? Did he do something to get rid of her? Did he bother telling you what? If you asked, WOULD he?"

More silence.

"Has it ever occurred to you that whatever questions you had DID matter? That maybe, just maybe, you didn't ask them because of their lack of importance, but because they were the _most _important thing you could ask, and you KNEW the whole house of cards would come tumbling down with it?" Robin said. "Of course, clearly the Lord thinks it was important enough to do. If it was easy, he could have permanently turned Noel, or used the same technique on us during the Black Lantern incident. I'll wager he had to go more in-depth with you. Do something complicated. It ensures your loyalty. But what did he really sacrifice if what you ARE is what he GOT?"

"…it doesn't change ANYTHING! He's the only chance I have!"

"Why YOU, then?"

Silence, again.

"We haven't seen any use of the HBDD since the school, and it wouldn't have any real use to the Lord because it can't target specific people! Even if he SAW the potential you've clearly unlocked, he'd also see all the mental damage. He wants to purge the so-called worthless, why doesn't your brain fall under that? Zia's dangerous, homicidal, has no empathy…he already _had _someone like that, Haley Ann Roxx! You know what happened to HER!" Robin's voice echoed out from the dark. Marissa tried pinpointing his voice and blasting the area with lasers, but all she hit was wall and floor, and the brief surge of light did not illuminate Robin. "He goes against his own beliefs to devote effort to you…and hell, it didn't really work! I remember something else about the Black Lantern incident: you completely shut down in front of your father until Raven and the Lord interfered!"

"Shut up." Marissa said, her voice an odd mix of dead and stressed. She'd used up all of her exotic weapons, but her machine had some practical backups, like micro-missiles. The explosions only blew up more of the room, and Robin's form was only a briefly glimpsed shadow that quickly vanished into the murk. The unnatural nature of Etemenanki was now working against Marissa: none of the walls or floor would stay burning and provide even tiny amounts of light.

"I mean, if he wants to be PRACTICAL, and he just wants puppets, he'd go after SANE people, martial artists, weapon experts, scientists, people like that! Wipe them clean and rebuild, like he did with Genocide! Instead he takes you, damaged broken you…and he doesn't even succeed! He needs to constantly suppress your issues for you to fight! Did you visit him before we arrived on this island? I bet you did! And you see what happens when you're away from him! He hands you a stacked deck and…well, I'm rambling on about this, aren't I? You aren't even a decent taunt! We regret failing you, but you don't rank in our upper echelons, Marissa! The Lord knows that, SHOULD know that! Know ALL of this! So WHY IS HE GIVING YOU THIS CHANCE? WHAT'S THE POINT? And if your answer is to show the world, and us, where we're wrong…then why aren't you feeling all right?"

"…you claim ignorance here?" Marissa said, her voice cold and dull. "You, the 'hero'? You really think he can fix EVERYTHING? No…but he can do more than you. He can give me a new start…and when it's over…he can give me a blank slate."

The silence on Robin's side lasted three seconds.

"Marissa…when is 'done'? Really, if you want so bad to be useful to him for the chance he gave you and this further chance…if you become such a thing…why would he ever let you go?"

"…I'm earning my keep, that's all, I'm…this…"

Marissa's screen lit up, her eyes jerking down. One of the pressure sensors under various part of the Jabberwocky's armor plate had lit up. Which meant-

Marissa yanked the machine's left arm up and raked it across her mech's back as best she could. She realized a second later that she had absolutely no idea if she'd hit Robin, glanced him, maimed him, or killed him. She suspected he'd keep quiet even if she managed to cut him in half. And while she had rough visual sensors that could give her a read of the machine's back, none of them functioned in the dark. She needed LIGHT…!

Robin crouched down and held on as best he could as the Jabberwocky leaned up and spewed fire up towards the ceiling. Several flaming droplets landed on him, but his armor provided even less fuel than the room and sputtered out within a second. Now, if he'd guessed correctly…

Marissa reversed the Jabberwocky and aimed its back towards a wall again.

Robin calmly jumped off, let the machine smash itself against the stone and metal, and then when it reared forward, jumped back on. Now…he just needed to find the right…

Plate.

The overlaid metal armor let out a slight whining shriek as Robin drove his staff into it. It was time for the final test of metallurgy. Would the shifting armor snap his weapon in two, or would the staff prove resistant enough that he could, if he properly combined it with the machine's increasing frantic movements, lever off a plate and get into the guts of the machine, and better yet, its batteries?

"EITHER GIVE ME A STRAIGHT ANSWER OR JUST DISMISS ME AS A LIAR! BUT IF YOU COULD DO THAT, YOU WOULD HAVE STOPPED RESPONDING A WHILE AGO!" Robin yelled, pouring on the mental strain while he waited for the precise moment to utilize physical strain.

"He helped me…he doesn't hurt me…he won't hurt me…not if I win…have to win…kill you…" Marissa said, and tried to bash Robin with the mech's tail again. Robin slid aside, and finally pushed down on his staff. An alarm lit up on Marissa's computer screens. One of the armor plates was being compromised.

"I'M BETTER NOW!" Marissa yelled, and promptly threw her machine into a tumbling roll.

* * *

What was the point of it all?

Nigicalnack Hastionfarlock had been born with every part of his life laid out for him. Blacktrinians lived for conquest and war, and that is what Nigel would do. It didn't matter if bloodlust and killing wasn't in him; that spoke of _his _failing and not his people's, and he would either adapt or die forgotten and alone. Between that cruel seeming-inevitability and other factors, Scalpel had ultimately decided to take a third option and run. He'd ended up on Earth, with the Teen Titans, but the war had followed him, both literally and metaphorically. Scalpel had, for years, justified the new fighting in that it wasn't the pointless slaughter of his species, whose ultimate purpose had long vanished into history and the eyes of those who would seek advantage. There was a point to this. In the Blacktrinian Empire, trying to prevent death was impossible, hopeless, and pointless. On a superhero team, it was not only very possible, it was your primary goal. That was a good enough reason to fight…

Then they'd died. And come back. Even though he didn't remember it, Scalpel never wanted to repeat it. He'd tried so hard…

All for naught. Noel was dead. Scalpel, as much as he hated war, knew enough about it to know what his death meant. This whole mess with the Lord was _winnable_, but there was no victory here. It would chew up everyone involved and spit out a few scraps of meat that were once whole, living beings, and even if they were alive and capable of recovery, who they were would be gone, possibly never to return. On top of that, the Lord would go to his end screaming about how the Titans were blind fools who were dooming the world in their benevolence, and that only his harsh madness would save this species from itself. From some of its examples, Scalpel couldn't help but think the Lord had a point. Not that he and his teammates were wrong, but that there was no way to do right, when all was said and done. Like his world, his species, all of them were just 'born wrong', and would either adapt or die.

True, his teammates were still fighting. Torment was still holding on, and beyond him loomed the Lord. Even so, when Noel's death had hit home…Scalpel had just felt the fire blink out. So long, so hard…all for nothing. Death could not be stayed in the end.

Whether it killed you proper or who you were.

The worst part of it all though?

Torment was a child, someone who understood power (and had an irritating knack for getting it), but with little understanding for war. If Torment had actually managed to use his powers in a viable, tactical manner, this fight would have been over ages ago. His enjoyment, arrogance, and clear love of explosive bombast exposed his weakness in these matters…

And even HE knew Scalpel had become disenfranchised. The alien was still throwing punches, kicks, and whatnot with every bit of strength and skill he had…but it didn't have the same fire. And his enemy, even with his undercooked brain, knew it. Nigel could see it in Torment's eyes.

"Oh, what's wrong alien? Having a crisis of confidence?"

Scalpel snap-kicked Torment backwards. The Genocide member turned his tumble into a backwards flip, manifesting more sickly green energy and hurling it at Scalpel. Scalpel lunged aside in turn, but was too slow…

The replicated Starbolts didn't feel like them. Scalpel had been on the receiving end of the real deal during training. Those projectiles were hot and concussive, like Kory's namesake. These ones felt more like something was trying to bite pieces out of Scalpel's flesh, burning maws biting into him before violently kicking him away. It hurt, but Scalpel was good with pain. He even kept his feet.

"Hmmm, maybe not." Torment said, holding up an arm. A mass of stone flew up and altered into a hand-held gatling cannon, one twice as big as the ones Torment had transformed his arms into. Seizing it, he swung it around and began firing hundreds of tiny green 'Mawbolts', Scalpel diving for cover as Torment raked the ground with more explosions.

"HOW ABOUT NOW?"

Cyborg's solar blade did fair double duty as a traditional laser sword, the red energy cutting through Torment's cannon and across his wounded chest, though the only indication of that fact was a strong wince.

"Oh, you want some too?" Torment said, dodging away from another slash.

"Just SHUT UP, YOU DISGUSTING PIECE OF SHIT." Cyborg hissed, as he stomped on Torment's foot to lock him down and, even as his sun-blade retracted, repeatedly punched Torment in the gut as hard as he could.

"…You mad, bro?" Torment said (un-ironically, at that). "Pissed off that I copied your teammate's power? I can see why she's so bubbly…this stuff…"

The gray tendrils erupted from Torment's body, seizing Cyborg, while Torment manifested more green power from his right hand, the energy burning above his palm.

"IS A BLAST!" Torment yelled, slashing out his arm, simultaneously backhanding the Titan and letting loose a gigantic green blast that sent him flying.

Directly into Torment again, as he warped behind Cyborg and spun his leg.

"AND A KICK!" Torment said, and buried his foot into the Titan, accompanying the blow with another horrific explosion of green power. Cyborg flew through the air, out of control.

Into Starfire's arms. The alien placed him gently on the ground and then went straight for Torment. Strangely, she did not launch at Starbolts, instead closing for hand to hand combat. Torment sneered, blocking her punches; his technique was sloppy, but one could get away with a lot when you had armor and protection of his caliber.

"You know, I was warned about you, your ability to surprise people with anger and power…NOT SEEING IT!" Torment said, manifesting his green replicant power and moving to punch Starfire with it. The alien mirrored the blow, right down to the energy manifestation; the two fists struck each other, the blast consuming both.

Torment was the one who flew from the explosion, alarmed surprise covering his feature.

"You understand little of my power and deserve it even less." Starfire said, floating out of the smoke, both hands alight with emerald rage. "I will make you as sorry as your pathetic excuse for _kyn _is."

"Kyn…ah, yes. Your term for righteous fury…hmmm, I speak alien now. Weird." Torment said, and gestured with a finger. "Take your best shot."

Starfire slammed her hands together and fired.

Torment blurred away, the green projectile exploding where he'd been, the Genocide member reforming next to Starfire, his own hand raised.

He found Starfire already facing him. He also discovered she hadn't fired the whole blast of power at where he'd been. Rather, she'd 'popped the cork', and now that he'd nicely put himself so close, she 'emptied the bottle' into him. Torment vanished in the explosion.

Starfire immediately began flying away, not planning to wait around to see the end results.

Still not fast enough. Torment's leg extended out of the black smoke and ash, kicking Starfire before the tornado of red spiral power slammed into her, knocking her upward. The smoke rapidly blew away with a wave of Torment's arm, even as he kept his leg extended and out, the limb abruptly snapping apart and reforming into his rail cannon.

"NOW WHO'S PATHETIC?"

The rail did not strike the alien head on, but Torment's super-advanced detection systems heard the faint noise of bones breaking as the magnetized rod delivered its payload against the Titan. Even in a somewhat glancing strike, Starfire was spun down into the ground with another painful crash…though Torment didn't really get to see this as he'd been thrown onto his face by the feedback of his shot.

"…I meant to do that…" Torment said, getting up…before he briefly fell to one knee. "So…we done? Anyone else wanna beat their head…on a wall?"

Torment no longer had hairs on the back of his neck, but he still felt the sensation of them standing up, an abrupt sense of alarm and danger, He jerked his head up.

Morgue corrected her line of sight within half a second, and then, with the parts she'd removed from her plasma cannon, grenade launcher, and specialized modifications she'd had on her person, she pulled the trigger on her rifle and promptly put the .505 Gibbs rifle round into the side of Torment's head.

She was done watching her friends throw themselves into the fray. She was done with the exhaustion and the pain. She was done, period. This had long ceased to be a superhero battle. This was life and death, and Morgue knew where she fell.

…Except Torment didn't.

He staggered several feet, weaving like he was drunk, putting a hand to the side of his head.

Then, as broken bullet fragments rained down, he allowed himself a brief, mad laugh.

"He IS God." Torment cackled. "I am his angel of death…cast in his image…I can't be stopped…he won't let me…"

Beast Boy leapt in and kicked Torment in the head as hard as he could, using the form of a kangaroo and striking in the exact same spot Sophie had shot. She didn't really pay attention. The man, the thing, had taken the modern version of a bullet that had been loaded in history's famed elephant guns, directly to the head, and he'd laughed it off. It had broken on him.

That was it. She was done. Pulling off her mask, Sophie sat down and waited for the end to come. Gauntlet, unfortunately, was occupied, and could not prevent this bit of history from repeating itself.

Neither could Beast Boy, who turned into a rhinoceros and attempted to drive his horn into the spot where his kick had failed. Torment grabbed HIM instead, flipping him over and punching him away, his not-built-for-grace body just managing to become a rat before he hit the ground.

"Now, if you predictable asswipes stick to the trend, it's time for the fashion model and the Lantern wannabe to take another poke, right?" Torment said.

"_Hey! I'm no fashion model! I like eating!"_

"_Ignore him, we…Terra, are you throwing giant rocks a few miles away at nothing for some reason?" Gauntlet said._

"_What? No…"_

The Genocide member was not expecting the answer to his question to be a cough, and he turned to look at Scalpel, who was standing nearby, his glaive resting on one dust-covered shoulder.

"Or you could come back. Why?" Torment said. "You're dead inside, alien. I can see it. Or do you just want to commit suicide?"

"…you really don't seem to understand what you're doing, do you?" Scalpel said, his voice quiet and dull.

"Does understanding really matter? Your friends just went crazy and still failed. My master is this world's new god, red scary skies or not. Hell…why go after ME? _I _didn't kill your teammate. He did. Yet…you try and smash _me_. I'm not all that smart, but even I can see some things. You know you can't win. Not against him. News flash: You can't beat me either. Why don't you just pronounce the time of death?"

Scalpel lifted his glaive…and slowly began to spin it between the fingers on his right hand. It seemed more like he was trying to exercise the digits then perform any kind of attack.

"…what's that supposed to do, hypnotize me?" Torment said.

"No. Give you a splitting headache."

"Well, it's not working."

The blade crashed against Torment's neck, catching the Genocide member off guard…and snapping off at its own neck. Torment growled in irritation, and then yelled as Scalpel pulled back and tried to plunge the end of the now-broken weapon into one of Torment's eyes. The Genocide member grabbed the weapon, but Scalpel had clearly expected that and let go as well, closing in and slashing at his neck in the same spot he'd hit with the glaive.

"Son of a bitch!" Torment said, dropping the weapon and slashing out his own hand. Scalpel did a leap that would have made figure skaters envious, jumping and spinning over Torment as the ground where he'd been standing exploded. Torment snapped a blind kick behind himself, only for Scalpel to dodge and claw at his neck again.

"THAT'S NOT GOING TO-!" Torment yelled, turning around.

Scalpel's hand rammed into his open mouth and yanked itself out. Torment screamed and stumbled back, hands clasped over his face.

Scalpel would have paused there. Scalpel would have flicked the blood off his claws and made a comment. Scalpel might have decided that he could get Torment to waste even more energy if he ran, and after how long the fight had gone on, that might be the crucial trick to finish it.

Nigicalnack Hastionfarlock of Blacktrinia just slashed Torment in the neck again. When that didn't work, he ducked away from Torment's clumsy backhand (due to the fact that Torment was still holding his wounded mouth) and promptly did it again, sparks flying from his claw.

Psychokinetic force erupted off of Torment, throwing Scalpel backwards. He kept his feet and actually CHARGED IN AGAIN, only for Torment to beat him to the punch, or rather the charge, blurring forward and shoulder-ramming into Scalpel, slamming him down onto the ground before Torment began raining down mad punches.

"FUCKING ALIEN!" Torment raged, blood flying from his mouth. He didn't even care most of his punches weren't connecting; all he needed was one good hit. "FUCK YOU! FUCK-!"

Scalpel bit his tongue and spat some of his blood into Torment's eyes, causing him to reel back and scream again. The Blacktrinian promptly swung a leg up and kicked Torment in the neck as hard as he could, more sparks flying.

"Sophie?" Cyborg said, having semi-dragged himself to the mortician's side, his body barely functioning while it re-routed power around damage. He had trusted his teammates to keep their enemy busy, but the fact that Morgue was just sitting there while her boyfriend brutally fought for his life (and to take life, but Cyborg had decided to ignore that fact for now) was more than enough to make him put himself in the firing line. "Are you hurt?"

"…I want to go home."

"WHAT?"

"This…it's impossible. Shot him in the head. Ignored it. Done." Sophie said.

"You…want to QUIT?"

"I can't see a point in continuing to fight in a vacuum." Morgue said. "We were tasked to beat the odds. We can't."

"We…"

"Can keep pulling the lever and hope that the 7's line up. You know the truth about gambling, Cyborg. The house always wins."

Cyborg took two seconds to consider the situation, a situation that you never contemplated until it happened, and yet seemed brutally obvious in hindsight.

Sophie Mathews didn't just have a unique bio-morphic ability. In fact, her ability to transform like that had come from the mutated blood she had ingested, which had prematurely triggered her metagene and caused it to take on an aspect she would not have otherwise possessed. Her true power, as it had turned out, was super-intelligence, allowing her to possess a brain that could do calculations and assessments that would take 'lesser' humans far longer to do, with considerably more difficulty. Bio-morphic shifting like her bat-swarms tended to function under three controlling fields: magic, a kind of modified instinct (which allowed very limited use of the power, as instinctual thought could not comprehend tactics or react well to battlefield chaos), or advanced intelligence that functioned as a makeshift hive mind. The way her power had been altered by the mutagen had caused its original purpose to emerge slower, but it was there: Cyborg had seen it in the way Sophie solved problems.

The problem with such advanced intelligence is it didn't interact with emotion well, an issue that had cropped up many times throughout history. Most super-geniuses either felt no emotion, or ended up with the two aspects mixing together in a toxic stew (Lex Luthor came to mind in that regard). Sophie managed to avoid those pitfalls…mostly. Now, in the extreme stress of this battle, the worst one she'd ever endured…

Her brain had taken over. And it had calculated that this battle was hopeless. All emotion, all bonds of friendship and camaraderie, had faded underneath the never-ending exertion. If he didn't figure out a way to toss fuel on the dying embers, far too much could go even further wrong…

But what to say to DO that? He couldn't just harp on her giving up, that would just make things worse. He couldn't, and wouldn't lie to her; lying was a reason things had gotten this bad. Maybe he could present it as a quandary for her brain to try and work out as rapidly as possible…if she even had the tools to do that. Cyborg did a quick scan to check her for injuries and what she had left in th-

…what was THAT?

Cyborg zoomed in with his scan to confirm. If the situation were more normal, he might have taken the time to be surprised, or feel bad for prying. It was not, and so Cyborg acted accordingly.

"Sophie! You can't give up!"

"Why?"

Cyborg whispered it in her ear. Normally, he never would have been so dramatic, but he had to make sure she registered it. From the way her whole body tensed up, she did.

"…give me cover." Morgue said, standing up and pulling her mask back on. Scalpel, in the meantime, had been doing his best to hold onto Torment in order to keep him from blurring away and putting distance between them. Torment's injured eyes had kept him from landing any solid blows, and Scalpel had slashed him in the neck several more times before finally letting go.

Torment, predictably, was too stunned by this sudden turn-around to immediately zip away. Scalpel used the second to slip around him, jump on his back, grab his head, and yanked as hard as he could. The shriek of metal was lost under Torment's own scream, and it was telling that instead of one of his many weapons he just grabbed Scalpel's foot and smashed him into the ground like a sledgehammer. Repeatedly.

"When I figure out how to replicate that acid blood power, I'm going to use it to give you a fucking enema." Torment said when he was done, the alien lying at his feet.

"Incendiary." Scalpel whispered.

"WHAT THE FUCK EVER!" Torment said, thrusting his arms out on either side of him, gathering power…

Sophie promptly grabbed both of them.

"Details are important." Morgue said, and promptly did something she'd theorized she could do and had never tried for very obvious reasons: she disassembled her arms into bats while doing the exact same thing to Torment's. For all his intelligence, even the Lord hadn't seen THAT one coming.

Torment let out a small, strangled noise as he was literally disarmed, his shoulders now ending in weird flesh and metal stumps. Sophie took no chances and immediately reformed her own arms, the sickly looking gray bats that had come from the process reforming to Torment's own arms, now clutched in hers. The Genocide member almost looked pitiful in his misery, staring at the Titan who had maimed him so.

"For example, I doubt you can fight half as well with these familiar aspects removed."

"…probably not." Torment rasped.

His arms exploded into bats again, Morgue's eyes going wide as they flew back over and reformed back into appendages. Literally half a second later, Cyborg's sonic cannon slammed into his hand, the blast twisting into and being absorbed into his palm.

"Then again, it helps that the master blessed me further in this battle. Or did you forget about that part?" Torment said, summoning a bat on his hand before it turned metallic and armed itself with miniaturized sonic cannons. "Looks like. Thanks."

Morgue promptly kicked Torment in the groin as hard as she could. He was not as affected by it as the arm transformation.

"Feel better?"

"Actually yes." Morgue said, and dove away before the sticky grenade she'd slapped onto Torment's hip when he'd been distracted went off. The sound of dark laughter emitted from the cloud in the wake of the blast, Torment strolling out while he converted his arm into his own version of the sonic cannon.

"Worth it." Torment said, and turned his eyes back to Cyborg.

* * *

Terra's denial had been correct; she had not thrown the giant rock Robert Candide had seen across the battlefield of the island. Perhaps that counted for something, as the Lord carved it in half with one single-armed slash.

Then again, maybe Shadow-Terra's obviousness was intentional, as more of her 'fellows' immediately appeared where the Lord had bisected the rock.

Torment's stolen Starbolts felt like flaming teeth trying to bite. The Shadow-Starfire's Starbolts felt like drills, the energy lacking any real heat, instead substituting brutal cutting pressure. Shadow-Cyborg's cannon felt equally off, striking with sledgehammer impact instead of vibrational. The Lord vaguely saw Shadow-Robin in his peripheral vision, and wondered what his copied Birdarangs would feel like. He didn't get to find out; Shadow-Robin leapt and slashed through his body with his Birdarang-sword instead.

It hurt, it all hurt…yet it didn't. Maybe Raven could overwhelm him, but she'd ruined her chance to _hurt _him. Maybe that fact was sinking in, the way she was now keeping her distance, hands out, directing her shadow-Titans.

She couldn't _hurt _him. The same could not be said for her, though…

She'd made a clone of him, too. Her now-lost lover. An inescapable folly of hers. She could exclude him, and in doing so, be reminded of what she'd lost in his absence. Or she could include him, and send him into battle…

Like he was now, gray lines of energy seeking to impale the Lord's form...

The Lord promptly slashed right through them. She had chosen to include him, and so she would watch him die all over again.

At least, if Shadow-Savior had not ignored his faux-Shimmer being slashed and promptly kicked the Lord into the ground. When he landed, Raven dropped several spheres of hellfire onto him as an added bonus.

"…She tasks me…she heaps me…" The Lord's voice echoed out of the smoke. "I see in her outrageous strength, with an inscrutable malice sinewing it…"

The Lord blew the smoke away with a gesture, hellfire still burning on his body. He barely seemed to notice, Raven floating down before him.

"That inscrutable thing is chiefly what I hate; and be the white whale agent, or be the white whale principle, I will wreak that hate upon her. Talk not to me of blasphemy, child; I'd strike the sun if it insulted me."

Normally, Raven would have told the Lord to make up his mind with his quoting material, going from Nietzsche to the Bible and now onto Moby Dick. Raven as she was now, though, likely couldn't even remember how to speak. Just to scream, and bring forth more hellfire.

The Lord dodged this one…which allowed Shadow-Scalpel to impale him. Raven waved her hand, firing a myriad of tiny hellfire orbs. Shadow-Morgue broke into bats and grabbed onto them, carrying them to the Lord and settling on him before they exploded.

The bats did not return. The Shadow-Titans did not react to this fact.

The Lord did, delighted mocking laughter drifting out of the smoke as it cleared. The Lord's face was literally on fire, but he laughed anyway, blurring away as the Shadow-Titans went for him.

"You cast their image…and yet destroy them." The Lord said. The explosion had indeed taken Shadow-Morgue's bats with it, and by extent the copied Titan. "I've done far worse than kill you…I've hurt you. And I wish to go on hurting you. I shall make you what you sought to make me…marooned in the center of a dead morality. Buried alive…buried alive…"

Shadow-Cyborg blasted out missiles, Shadow-Starfire adding to it with Starbolts, while Shadow-Robin actually threw false Birdarangs this time. The Lord jumped away from all of it, before Shadow-Beast Boy loomed over him. The copy had turned into a dragon, and it immediately revealed it was not bound by the original's limits as it breathed hellfire onto the Lord. The Lord blocked it with a shield, the ground melting around him. The fact that the Lord blurred away a few seconds later, instead of striking back, was inexplicable…

Before he crashed down onto Shadow-Savior.

"How easy it must be…a creature that no longer feels pain, can no longer suffer…" The Lord said, and impaled Shadow-Savior with his blade, stabbing at him, intertwining his words with his blows. "IT-MAKES-THIS-SO-VERY-DULL!"

Raven slammed into the Lord with her own shriek, a blade of flame impaling him. The Lord snarled at the blow, before laughing again and slashing with his hand, carving deep into Raven's arm and forcing her to withdraw the blade. Blood vaporized from her limb as it emerged, the Lord teleporting back to Shadow-Savior and blasting the clone into the ground. The Titan-replica sent a multiple of cutting, piercing lines at him, but the Lord barely seemed to notice, reaching out and grabbing the false Titan by the head, slamming it into the ground.

"What a pity…I can't peel him like a grape. Like the first time. Do you remember that?"

Raven's cloak flowed out, burning flames and destructive arcs of energy blazing towards the Lord. "Seems so."

The Lord teleported away from the attack, returning to solid form only to be attacked by Shadow-Gauntlet and Shadow-Scalpel. Fists and blades tore into him, Raven appeared in the background and cutting loose with her own blades, the rest of the shadow-Titans fanning out…

Except Shadow-Savior, who was still on the ground. After a few seconds, Raven turned her head.

"Mistake."

Raven didn't bother looking back at the Lord; she just teleported on instinct, appearing high up in the sky…

The Lord promptly blasted Shadow-Cyborg to pieces, the Titan construct breaking apart and disintegrating. She'd been expecting an attack on her person, and the Lord had used it to cut down one of her creations instead.

"Further mistake." The Lord, blurring away on the ground, passing by Shadow-Savior. Raven flew down on instinct, forming a shield between the two. The Lord didn't even look at him, instead stopping to laugh, while the remaining Shadow-Titans closed in.

"If I cannot replicate the far past…then perhaps the ultimate truth?" The Lord said, and slashed at the ground. Dark energy erupted from the wound, but it did not attack Raven or the Titans. Instead, it flowed up.

Took a shape.

Took definition. Noel again, this time cast in the myriad blacks of an Abhorred.

"You think his death means anything? No. He's mine. As are you, blackbird. And you will bring the rest to me. God is a thought who makes crooked all that is straight."

"**I WILL EAT YOUR SOUL." **Raven thundered, and her four eyes lit up, blasting obliterating energy at the Lord.

He blocked it with one hand, the beams parting and lashing across the ground around him.

"You'll go hungry."

Raven slashed out her arms, and the fires spawned by her deflected beams erupted into a hellstorm that made the one Hyperthermia had created seem small, the fire engulfing the Lord, the shadow Titans, and the false Abhorred-Noel. Raven flew down into the flames, vanishing without a trace.

Horrendous impacts rang out, patches of the unholy flame blown out by even more intense magicks. Abhorred-Savior stood up remarkably well to the fire, and even better against the Shadow-Titans as they struck, shot, and slashed at him, though he could muster little offense against the tide. Shadow-Savior finally came back into play, leaping down and lashing at Abhorred-Savior, the two locking blades, horns, and just about everything else…

Which let Shadow Starfire, Gauntlet, and Beast Boy close in and rip through the Abhorred version of their teammate. Its shape wavered, and then another massive impact rocked the island as Raven and the Lord emerged from the fire, Raven slamming her enemy into the scorched ground and digging burning red talons into him.

"**WRETCHED BEAST."**

"To the core." The Lord spat back out, and reached out and clenched his fist.

Abhorred-Noel exploded, the black energies surging up and blowing apart Shadow-Savior as well. Raven's head jerked towards the sight, her mouth opening to scream…

Teeth broke as the Lord ripped himself from beneath her claw and smashed his fist into her face. Tumbling backwards, Raven felt the control of her hellfire be torn from her in turn, the Lord seizing control of the destructive forces and sweeping it across the landscape. The rest of the Shadow-Titans were caught in the wave, burned away and turned to ash, before the fire funneled up and to the Lord's hand.

"It beats a soul." The Lord said, absorbing the flame. "Wouldn't you say, Trigonspawn?"

An impossible silence seemed to fall on Raven. Blood ran down her face from her nose and chin, black and red arcs of energy sparking on her body.

The crimson energy that lit up her gaze would have melted the eyes out of a mortal man's head. Reaching up to her face, Raven smeared the blood onto her hand and transferred it to the other one, blackness arcing between her crown-like horns, inhuman eyes opening up in the darkness of her cloak.

The Lord's only response was a subtle, yet manic grin. Blood magic. He'd used it, and now she was doing so in turn.

"Now THAT'S interesting." The Lord said, settling into a defensive stance on the rock platform he was standing on. "Can you incinerate the blood of something that doesn't bleed?"

"ALL THINGS BLEED."

The twisting, writhing orb flew at the Lord so fast it broke the sound barrier. The Lord thrust out his hand and ripped the blood-entropy magic apart, dispelling it in less than a second. It was a brutal, crude dissemination, but the Lord had the biggest hammer in the whole world now, and as far as he was concerned, there was nothing he couldn't treat like a nail.

Raven hurled another orb. The Lord broke it apart. A third was split in half and deflected…which prompted golden beams to erupt from the sphere, the Lord recoiling from the unexpected solar energy.

"VERY good…!" The Lord said, looking at Raven…who had used his distraction to form a fourth orb. One the size of her. "Ah."

Raven hurled the destroying magic. The Lord had to use both his hands this time, thrusting them out, grabbing onto the orb and deflecting it up and away from himself…

Too easy. It was too easy…and the Lord found out why when Raven followed up the attack with a far smaller and faster one, the blast catching him on the shoulder and burning through. When the Lord raised his other arm to try and defend himself, the speed orb that had followed immediately behind the one that had struck the Lord's shoulder blew off his hand.

"…Beautiful." The Lord said. Raven's only response was her continued murderous gaze, the Titan holding up her hands and spawning a rainbow of blood-entropy orbs that she fired rapidly at her enemy.

They did not blow him to pieces. Even with his wounds, and infused with solar energy, the Lord defended himself, some of the blasts striking him and doing nothing to stop him from deflecting others and tearing apart still more. One glanced his face, briefly burning away his features, but the skull just grinned at Raven before the face reformed. Raven unleashed another barrage, but this one was even less effective, the Lord fending off the blows with one hand while writing sigils on the air with the other…

Then he glanced up.

Then he was gone, blurring away. Raven prompt switched to her own defenses…

The shock cut through her rage like a knife. He wasn't trying to attack. He was retreating…no. He was going somewhere else across the island…

…her feint.

The Lord had blazed his way across the island, burning through power to get there in time. Too much power. He didn't have the energy to deflect it again.

Fine by him. The Lord stopped, set his stance, and interlocked his arms as the Raven-sized orb dropped down onto where he'd inadvertently sent it.

The explosion reduced the beach to a molten wasteland, boiling away tens of thousands of gallons of water and shattering the nearby cliff faces. Raven rode out the waves, flying in to where the Lord had taken her blast, her hands blazing to fire more…

The blast flew out of the smoke, catching Raven off guard as the explosion knocked her to the ground. She surged back up, the Lord's form becoming visible.

As did Hyperthermia's. The girl's frozen form stood behind the Lord, the ice stained black with soot, but still intact. The Lord's form was ragged and breaking apart, but his face was clear. He'd been checking, a moment ago, to make sure she didn't try and seize control of the big blast and try and blindside him with it, but he'd discovered something else about its trajectory, and taken appropriate steps.

The scene froze Raven. She'd fired the blast as a feint; all she'd known was it wouldn't go far enough to hurt her friends. Instead, it had almost dropped down onto the Genocide member.

She would have killed her. Raven was not so far gone that she couldn't see what the woman had endured, that she was as much a victim of the Lord as Noel was. And she would have killed her. Never realizing she was there. As long as she got to kill the Lord.

"…Don't…touch…MY PROPERTY." The Lord snarled.

Raven tried to summon solar energy again. It would harm the Lord, it wouldn't hurt the-

Doubt. Horror. It affected delays in terms of microseconds, but that was all the Lord needed as he blazed forward, seizing Raven and driving her forward, the pair ripping a line across the island.

"So! You were saying things about eating my soul, destroying me, etc etc…I'd say the line between us just got obliterated for good, didn't it? What say you, shadow of mine? Do you realize there's nowhere left to go but DOWN?"

Raven clawed the Lord's face off, vanishing into red mist a moment later and appearing high up in the sky, her blood-red clouds burning in her presence.

"You'll die first." Raven said, raising a hand.

The Lord blurred in front of her, his face already reformed.

"I THINK NOT."

The Lord's clawing blow sent Raven crashing into the ground with island-shaking impact.

"Regarding life, the wisest men of all ages have judged alike: it is worthless." The Lord said, and put himself into freefall, flying down towards Raven.

The sorceress met him with far greater intensity than anticipated, blazing out of her crater and slashing into the Lord as he closed in. The Lord took the attack, returning it with his own, rending an ugly wound across Raven's front before he flipped and spun away. His injuries swiftly closed; Raven's did not.

"…you…don't…THINK." Raven whispered.

"…One may sometimes tell a lie, but the grimace that accompanies it tells the truth."

"KILL YOU-!"

The ground exploded beneath the Lord as he went for Raven…splitting into several dozen shadows, the false images blurring all around Raven. Raven snarled and lashed out with her own shadows, talons and claws and teeth ripping into every motion she saw.

"**YOU WILL NEVER HAVE THIS WORLD!"** Raven raged, pulling apart everything that lay before her gaze…

"Raven!"

Raven turned and lashed out at the noise. Robin's masked eyes went as wide as saucers as she nearly tore the Titan in half. The horror struck every cell in her chest, like a dagger of ice…

Robin shattered, the Lord following in his wake. An illusion. Quid pro quo.

"My power _**MOVES **_worlds!"

The Lord punched at the ground, the skyscraper-sized black eruption throwing Raven into the sky like a rocket. More energies surged around the Lord's form, and then he followed her, the same sigils he'd written earlier blazing into new life.

"Kill me? I AM death. Ashes to ASHES…!"

The Lord's fist slammed into Raven. The power shrieked across the whole sky, and the red was ripped from the clouds, the endless masses turning midnight black again. A gigantic rune appeared in the air around Raven's helplessly caught body…

The Lord teleported above her, the sigils changing as he summoned the hellfire he'd stolen earlier.

"_**DUST TO DUST!"**_

The explosion split the sky, even as the Lord went with his punch and lanced Raven down and into Etemenanki again, smashing through everything in his path until he finally drove Raven into the deepest, hardest depths. The final collision was so strong the Lord's body literally exploded apart on impact, the darkness surging away and reforming.

"…For the word of God is alive and active, Shaper than any double-edged sword…" The Lord said, glancing at his path of destruction behind him. He snapped his fingers, blast sparks flying back the way he came, the destruction reversing itself in its wake. With that done, the Lord turned back to look at his enemy. "It penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart."

Outside, the fire burning on Etemenanki died, like a candle being blown out.

Inside, down in its subterranean heart, fire erupted on Raven, completely consuming her. The Lord held up a hand, glancing over the light.

When it faded, Raven floated there, her outfit even more destroyed…and her wounds gone. Broken bones, shredded muscles, shattered teeth…all fixed beneath the flame.

"Then _**God **_shall die." Raven said, fiery clawed arms erupting from within her cloak. Her rage had finally burned so hot it had become cold. "For all you've done."

"…heh." The Lord said, calling his form-sword. _"Si tamen acta deos numquam mortalia fallunt, a culpa facinus scitis abesse mea."_

"_**ERRANTIS VOLUNTAS NULLA EST." **_ Raven said, and lashed out.

And as she did, the world screamed around her.

* * *

Marissa Mori had not just been chosen by the Lord for the advantages he could take of her. She _did _have a brilliant mind, with talents in areas beyond the mechanical. Just by interacting with the Lord and watching him plan, she'd picked up a few basics in battle tactics none of Genocide knew. The roll she had used while Robin was clinging to the back of her machine was a brilliant move; either Robin abandoned his weapon, or he got crushed.

But in the end, Marissa was still an abuse victim trying to think ahead of Tim 'Robin III' Drake. A young man who had locked mental horns with some of the best and brightest, as well as the worst and wretched. The sad fact was, Robin was thinking whole games ahead, let alone moves. It was what he was. The Boy Wonder title wasn't hyperbole.

He'd predicted the roll. And he'd not only guessed HOW the plates of armor would shift in such a move, and how best to take advantage, he'd figured, with fair accuracy, just how long the move would take before he was 'in danger'.

When the machine twisted its back, Robin shifted and levered his staff as hard as he could. The armor plate, roughly the size of a car trunk, snapped off, and Robin pulled himself into the gap of the machine's plates and braced himself before the mech rolled over, sparks shooting from the floor.

Marissa had seen the plate fall off, but not Robin's 'pocket protection' move. She was at least smart enough to check her sensor readings to see if she could detect him, but when they came up with nothing, Marissa rolled the beast back over onto its feet to check for a corpse.

Robin pulled himself out of the hole, Marissa's eyes going wide at the sight. He'd hidden in the machine itself! IF HE HAD ANY EXPLOSIVES-!

He didn't. What he did have were specially attuned 'force-knuckles' that Torment had dismissed as worthless. They would have been equally worthless against the Jabberwocky's armor, but with his staff lost, it was the only weapon he had left. He didn't know WHAT to hit, so he just started hitting everything under the armor plate he could, hammering away like a human pile driver.

Marissa went into an absolute panic. Everything was going wrong. She hadn't held back, she'd followed orders, she'd tried to kill Robin, she REALLY had…yet things kept going wrong. The Jabberwocky hadn't been supposed to be sensed properly; that had failed. It was not supposed to have had its armor compromised; that had also failed. While there was no 'makeshift self-destruct' button Robin could hit where he was striking, the Jabberwocky was still a prototype and hence has delicacies. If Robin damaged something, she could start having trouble controlling it, and if he found a way to damage the battery, then everything would go into a terminal velocity dive. Marissa had done her best to compensate for these kind of weaknesses, but she had no hard combat data to run against such compensations. A normal person would have concluded that they could only do as best they could, but Marissa, somewhat by nature, and by far too much tragic nurture, was NOT normal, and so felt fear at all the ways she could fail, at a level no human ever should.

And even THEN…she held the line. She did not start hitting the wrong switches, nor did she go into a blinded state where she began hitting every switch she had to see if anything stuck. The resolve under her terror was the greatest tragedy, in the end. She could have been so much, done so much…

Others, unfortunately, had wanted other things.

The hands hadn't been able to dislodge Robin when he'd just been on the armor, and they succeeded even less with Robin hiding inside the gap he'd made. Marissa then attempted to alter the path of the laser weapons in the machine's wrists and shoulders, only to quickly realize she'd either miss entirely or do more damage to her machine than Robin at the angles she would need to land a hit. The electrified 'skin' was in the armor plate itself, and with Robin's magnetic clamps she couldn't forcibly jostle him in the plates on either side of the hole she'd made. She couldn't get the angle that would allow her to launch a net over the hole and pin Robin down to the point where he'd be unable to properly swing his fists, and tossing anything explosive in was…

…wait.

Her machine gave off a great deal of heat. Normally she handled this through the usual sinks, but in the darkness below, with the machine having to rely entirely on its own internal batteries, said heat had spiked upward beyond their limits. It wasn't so bad that it risked damaging the machine, not yet…

But Robin was not a machine. He was flesh and blood, and he was forcing himself to stay stuck in a gap on the machine's armor that surely had to be hotter than hell, trying to damage it enough to disable it.

Unless she made it even hotter. She promptly cranked the dial that controlled her flamethrower fuel and dumped the remaining chemicals into the mixer. All of them.

Robin did not stop punching when the Jabberwocky leaned down and fired out a massive blast of fire all along the walls, though he jerked his head up to make sure Marissa hadn't pulled out some displacement trick to redirect the fire onto him. He couldn't see anything…

But he felt it, the metal beneath him going from scalding to full-on molten-esque. The Jabberwocky's skeleton and systems were designed to channel heat, and the damage Robin had done ended up working against him in that regard, as they could no longer redirect heat onward properly, instead causing it to cluster under him. Robin threw one more punch and felt his skin blister beneath his armored glove. He threw two more anyway, fighting through the pain, even as Marissa turned her fiery blast from the walls to the floor, sweeping the intense fire up and down the length of the room.

Robin hit his limit, scrambling out of the gap in the armor. The armor plate wasn't much better, but there was enough difference.

There was also enough light from all the fire that Marissa could see exactly where he was. And after what had just happened, she would risk further damaging another armor plate if it got Robin off of it, and promptly twisted up the Jabberwocky's arms as far as they could go and fired.

Robin dove out of the way, falling off the back of the Jabberwocky and into the fire below. He tumbled out, rolling to extinguish the chemicals before getting back up. Marissa swallowed and turned to face the machine around at Robin. She'd used up all the flamethrower fuel doing this, and she could feel her machine move a bit more awkwardly, indicating Robin had damaged or cut off SOMETHING…

"We'll blame it on the Lord!" Robin abruptly said. "ALL of it!"

Marissa didn't want to, but she froze up anyway.

"…Why? Because you don't want to die?" Marissa said.

"I promised to help you. The way you talk…the Lord has taken your situation and made it impossible. As far as I'm concerned, that means HE takes on the blame of everything you've done. EVERYTHING. If he wants to play puppet master, he can hang with his own damn strings."

"He didn't…"

"Yeah, he said it was your choice. What was the other choice, Marissa? Prison? Life on the street, fighting for food and dignity? Death, maybe? You've seen how the Lord handles people who dare defy him." Robin said. "Those aren't choices. Those are well-disguised commands, from someone who's trying to take the hard work out of a choice. So I won't. I'll keep the hard work in it. I made you a promise, and I WILL. KEEP. IT. Even if we have to blame everything on him."

The words felt heavy as they came out of Robin's mouth. In truth, he wasn't afraid of dying. He'd known about how likely that was, hell, he lived with that fact every day since he was fourteen years old. What scared him more was that he would fail. That Marissa Mori was too lost in the darkness to be saved, that her life would be defined and destroyed by the horrible acts of others. This offer he was making could, would change anything. The justice systems of the world only had some tolerance for superheroes on its best days, and only if they made sure they toed the line. The second you started making exceptions, even one, was the second the floodgates started to open. Was the rest of Genocide to be turned free then, despite trying so hard to murder his allies? The Lord had manipulated them too. What about the HAEYP, did all of their criminals get a free pass because Sebastian Blood had used mind control a time or three? Hell, did that mean Noel was the more wronged party in the end, and all the Titans should have begged his forgiveness for being so mad at his crime? Hell…the Joker was so unbelievably loony-toons that you couldn't really prosecute him for anything half the time too, should HE get any mercy…?

There were a lot of reasons to jump on the slippery slope. Not many got back off of it. Robin knew that. Tim Drake knew what he was tossing on the table to gamble.

Yet, for all of Batman's lessons about acceptable losses and unacceptable risks, there had always, ALWAYS been that one lone thread through it; always try to save the day. Perhaps you'd have to decide you couldn't, perhaps you'd have to pay a price for it, perhaps sometimes it couldn't be done…but always try.

And never forget that while there were systems to follow and ways to do it, a part of truth and justice would always be about choice. The same choice that set Tim and his ilk off on this calling, this grand adventure, this madness.

They said never do nothing. What nothing was _not _was far vaster than most could ever realize.

Marissa could feel the seconds stretching out. She could also feel something else stretching. That tiny part in her mind, one she had worked so hard to eliminate, one that had slipped out anyway in her weary exhaustion. The part that said that she really didn't want to be here. Didn't want to design weapons, didn't want to kill people…didn't really want to hurt anyone.

The same answer came back to her, as it always did.

"…I don't hate him, Robin." Marissa said. "I can't fail him, if I do…but I fear that. I don't fear him. You say these things, say we can just throw what happened in his lap and skip away…but he helped me Robin. You keep saying he didn't…but…between fearing his anger if I fail and what would come if I betrayed him…"

"He's not going to win."

"How can't he?" Marissa said. "He's part of the world you've fought every time the sun goes down. Has it weakened? Lessened? Ceased? You and he have wants, but you…you're just a boy. I'm just…a girl. He's…he's forever. Inevitable. You can't kill the night."

The Jabberwocky's arms opened up again, laser blasters aiming at Robin.

"…can't kill the night, Marissa?" Robin said. "The night dies every day."

There was no warning, no indication of what was coming. Even if the sound could have penetrated the walls of Etemenanki, the makers of it moved faster than it.

The ceiling did not so much cave in as it split open like a gutted fish, the Lord driving Raven through the stone and crystal before he literally slashed across half the room's floor, carving through it like a rabid chainsaw. The destruction missed the Jabberwocky by only a few feet, and that had been due to the angle the Lord had come in. Marissa nearly fell out of her chair in alarm, and Robin was tossed backwards from the force emitted, the young man thrown all the way to the far wall behind him.

And just like that, it was over. Marissa yanked herself steady to look at the damage to the room, barely illuminated in the fading fires she'd set…

"_**Magnificent bastard, is he not, Miss Mori?" **_The Lord whispered in Marissa's head. _**"Do not fear, though; your liege and God is great and terrible himself."**_

"Sir?" Marissa said, before her eyes saw the power readouts on the Jabberwocky spiking upwards. Marissa might have felt relieved…

If her machine hadn't abruptly lit up like a Christmas tree, white light beginning to burn all along the mech's body. The fear came roaring back. What had Robin done? Some sort of…

"_**That's MY power, Miss Mori. Now finish the job."**_

Robin came to that conclusion considerably quicker than Marissa, and by the time it sank in he was running towards the machine. His one lone stroke of luck was spying his lost bo staff on the ground; he snatched it up as he ran and leapt, going for the machine's knee.

Marissa got back at the controls and swung at her enemy.

The blow came out so fast that she missed Robin completely…and ending up throwing him across the whole room again with the slipstream. Unfortunately, the far-faster-than-expected blow caused the machine to overbalance and fall down. Robin managed to take control of his fall and end the tumble on his feet, and lacking any other options, he charged again.

Marissa armed the laser cannons and fired.

The blasts came out with such force that it not only threw the machine backwards, it screwed up the targeting computers; instead of blowing up Robin, it exploded almost directly in front of him, once again sending him crashing into the wall. Marissa fought to get the machine under her control; its power hadn't just returned to its former levels, it had exceeded it.

"…surrender!" Marissa said. Robin picked himself up, one arm hanging loose in his socket, the Titan having dislocated his shoulder in the impact.

Snapping a shoulder back in was not something you could do by banging your arm on a wall. Done wrong, one risked problems like minute bone fracture and damaged nerves and muscle tendons. Not to mention the process was agonizingly painful.

Robin not only snapped it back in right, he did so with virtually no reaction whatsoever. That, more than anything, made Marissa realize he was never coming willingly over to her side.

Which meant she had to kill him.

"…no." Robin said, and ran at the machine once more. Marissa took a moment to try and lock the sense of wrong away, and then moved to squash Robin like the insect he was compared to her machine.

* * *

"Now then, Victor…with all your friends having failed…why don't we see who's the REAL war machine?" Torment said, power coursing down both his arms.

"…fine. You win, Nester. YOU'RE the war machine." Cyborg said after the slightest pause. He didn't even bother raising his own arm cannon. Torment stared, then jerked his head around, looking for the ambush. He even manifested a shield in front of him as he did so, but Cyborg didn't try to blindside him. Neither did anyone else. Morgue and Scalpel had vanished again, and no one was coming to replace them.

"…Aha. What are you pulling, Victor? You can't be giving up, that's just not you." Torment said.

"No, I'm conceding the argument. You're the war machine. Because I'm not a machine."

Torment snorted.

"What, you take a blow to the head? Most of which is composed of machinery, I might add?"

"Nester…do you really think what makes up so much of me defines who am I? Are you that dumb?" Cyborg said. "Machines are tools. They do what their users want. Me…it doesn't matter how much I've changed since the accident, or how I've built on that since then. It doesn't matter that I can change the course of mighty rivers and bend steel with my bare hands because of it. I'm a man. It's why Fixit couldn't convert me. It's why Blood couldn't dominate me. It's why Numerous lost the numbers game, why DaFoe ended up part of her chaotic theories…why Llarness turned away from the dark. It's because of ME. Victor Stone is who I am. I'm part machine, not A machine. You? You'll do whatever he tells you. You ARE a machine. And above all else, you are a TOOL."

"Nice speech." Torment said, and turned his arm into another gatling gun, blasting Cyborg with miniaturized sonic blasts and Starbolts instead of bullets, the barrage driving the Titan to one knee. "But you're right. I got the tools, I got the talent."

"Dude…that isn't ANYTHING like he said. It really is one ear and out the other with you, isn't it?" Beast Boy said, having emerged at Torment's side.

"Oh look, Beastie Boy. Come to fight for your right to party?"

"…Dude, that was just LAME."

"Why think up good material for you lot?" Torment said. "Your best friend's over there desperately trying to figure out a way to make a few more scratches on me before I sell him off for spare parts, all of your other teammates are AWOL, and you? There are literally a thousand ways I could kill you. The only reason I haven't is because I haven't really TRIED. I am beyond any food chain, any concept of evolution, any living creature on this or ANY world. What the hell could you possibly turn into that would do more than sting?"

"…you wanna guess which word in there you shouldn't have said?" Beast Boy said, and turned into a tiger as he charged.

"Oh what, scratches?" Torment said, and opened fire on Beast Boy. Despite possessing almost the same amount of bulk, a jungle cat with a human mind proved far better at dodging the copied shots than Cyborg did. "Food chain? Spare parts? Material?"

Beast Boy leapt. Torment scoffed as he converted his arm back to a traditional hand.

"Really, help me out here." Torment said, catching the Titan and holding him above his head. His follow up line would have 'to me, it's living creature', had Beast Boy not immediately transformed.

Into a jellyfish. Specifically, _chironex fleckeri_, better known as the sea wasp. The term was an understatement. A normal wasp had one stinger. A jellyfish, using specialized cells unique to its species known as cnidocytes, had tens of thousands.

And Torment's metal armor was still torn up. And with the way the Genocide member was holding him, Beast Boy didn't even have to move: he just dropped the tendrils down onto Torment and let their impact on his damaged armor edges do the rest.

"GYAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!" Torment screamed. The fact that he was merely suffering brief, agonizing pain when he had been injected with enough poison to kill twenty grown men was lost on him; after enduring all sorts of superhuman offensive efforts, such abrupt agony was twice as bad, and disabling. So disabling, he actually tried to throw Beast Boy away from him, rather than fight back.

A fact that Gar Logan had actually predicted, at great risk. Jellyfish were among the most fragile creatures on the planet, and Torment could have killed him by accident a dozen different ways, let alone on purpose. Beast Boy, however, did not exuberate his risk; even before Torment tried to get rid of him, he transformed again.

Into another wasp. A tarantula hawk spider wasp to be specific. There was a ranking of pain when it came to insect stings, the Schmidt Index…and the tarantula hawk sat at Number 2 on the list.

He promptly stung Torment in the eye.

"AIIIIIIIIIIIIIAAAAAAAAAAHHHHH!" Torment screamed again, having gone from unaffected to his namesake in the space of three seconds, even as the changeling Titan flew away as fast as he could. Beast Boy _would _have turned into the No 1 insect ranked on said list, the bullet ant, but 1) A tarantula hawk wasp could fly, which he dearly needed, and 2) It would have broken the wasp theme.

"Have an idea now?" Beast Boy said.

Torment answered by slamming his fist down, and the island around him literally incinerated, a gigantic pillar of golden energy piercing the clouds above Torment and atomizing the stone to a depth of fourteen feet ten square meters around him. Nester Weames didn't notice or care if he'd hit anyone. He was too busy trying to get the pain to stop, and while his chest swiftly cooled off, his left eye continued to throb and swell, the vision in it blurring and filling with flashing dots. Torment tried to run through his programming, seeing if there was anything in there that helped with altered vision, but between his pain and frustration he quickly gave up, instead using some of the power he'd stolen from Raven to shut off the pain, and by extent his eye. He didn't need it!

"You know…I've found your kind really can't live up to your namesakes." Starfire said, floating down. "Your master rules nothing, your fellows don't have the stomach for that kind of mass slaughter, and you…well, what is that expression? You like to steal dishes but dislike having them stolen from you?"

"…what?" Torment said. He'd expected to be punched in his moment of confusion, but Starfire just remained floating there, filthy with dust and her own blood. "…wait, why aren't you trying to flip out and hit me? Your teammate's still dead, and you're still losing, whatever the eyes might have." Torment said, jerking his hand to point at his face.

"Would you believe I'm concerned that you're so weakened by your efforts and so in denial about it that if I lose control, I could kill you?"

"Please. Your lot already TRIED to kill me. Repeatedly. And I know how anger works with you heroes. It happens in great big explosions where you break all your rules, and then spend the rest of your lives regretting it. You should THANK me I was tough enough to withstand your rage."

"…I've learned a lot about rage since I've come to this planet." Starfire said.

"Not enough. You said something about namesakes? LIVE YOURS." Torment said, and his lone remaining eye flashed. Starfire was driven into the ground…feet first, as she remained upright and facing Torment. Summoning crimson energy to his hands, Torment began hurling red blast after red blast, Starfire holding up a green-energy hand to try and counter them. Her blasts only seemed to stop his own, but they did not disperse, merging with and expanding each other until Starfire vanished behind the floating red power. Torment spun his hands and thrust them out, firing one last blast that sent the mass exploding forward, vaporizing everything in its path, not even stopping as it hit the water, the force of the blast's passing sending forceful waves outward from it.

Starfire would have been destroyed under the assault, but she had, of course, moved out of the way. Torment had, in turn, expected that, and lanced forward to intercept her, black power burning on his fist. Starfire flew over him, and then as Torment stopped on a dime and immediately went for her back with a flying black-flame kick, she flipped up and over the villain, dodging both. Landing back on the ground at the same time as Torment, the villain snarled and hurled out several dark marble-likes spheres, the impact on the ground turning the orbs into pulverizing black whirlwinds that corkscrewed around the pair's combat area. Starfire promptly corkscrewed back, flying in a tight, weaving pattern that ensured all the tornados blew apart before they got her.

"STAND STILL!" Torment yelled, and unleashing another storm of micro-missiles. In his frustration he clustered them, Starfire staying one step ahead of their explosions. Torment turned one arm into the ultra-laser cannon he'd tried to use on Gauntlet, but he just succeeded in blowing up another cliff face as Starfire dodged at the last second.

At which point Torment shot at her with the giant handgun he'd manifested in his other limb, trying to use a slower bullet to throw off Starfire's timing.

She didn't dodge it.

Instead, she snapped up her arm, and the bullet ricocheted off the metal bracer she wore on her right wrist, the high-caliber shot flying into the sky. Torment's jaw didn't drop, but Starfire could tell he'd resisted the urge.

"Like I said. I've learned a lot since I came to this planet. From heroes. Champions…wonders." Starfire said. "Even if I give your master any credit…there's nothing he could teach worth knowing."

"…you'd think that." Torment said.

Then he blurred behind Starfire and grabbed onto her left, broken arm.

"Then suddenly the fact that I can actually SPOT WEAKNESSES comes into play." Torment said, and squeezed before Starfire could retaliate, feeling the broken bone grind beneath his grip. "Now then, I believe you said something about me not knowing my namesake?"

Starfire said nothing. She did not try to escape or retaliate. Instead, she turned her head to looking into Torment's eye. Torment expected an eye blast, and when one didn't come he was thrown off for two more seconds.

"WELL?" He finally said, squeezing even harder. Starfire's face remained a mask of stone, the only reaction the faint glint of tears in the corner of her eyes. "SAY SOMETHING, BITCH."

Starfire said nothing.

"Well, fuck you too then." Torment said, and drew his hand back to punch in her face.

Cyborg pressed his sonic cannon against the back of Torment's head at the same time.

"No, fuck YOU."

The sonic blast blew Torment forward into Starfire, and Cyborg, despite the successful blow, almost cried out in pain himself when he saw how the surprise attack caused further abuse to Starfire's arm.

Starfire, on the other hand, never said a word. She let her fist do the talking, slamming it into Torment's chest and unleashing all the energy she'd been charging up since she'd made her presence known. The two of them vanished in the flash of green, and when both hit the ground, Starfire landed on her feet. Torment's face-plant was considerably less graceful.

"Kory?" Cyborg said, carefully floating down next to his fellow Titan.

"I have endured worse." Starfire said, her voice neutral.

"We need to splint…"

"Anything you offer would be made of metal. He still has a magnetic weapon. I will bear it."

"Star…"

"Victor…he's not done. And neither am I." Starfire said. "For you…there is so much worse I would bear."

The alien then coughed, blood dribbling from her lips. She ignored that as well.

"…heh…I think…despite your claims…you feel worse than I look…" Torment said, dragging himself up. "…wow…I'm up…and at them…still. Marissa…you're a genius and a half…don't ever let anyone else…tell you different."

"…then why don't you give up while the giving up's good?" Cyborg said.

"Why do that when I can still kick all your asses?"

"If you could do THAT, why haven't you yet?" Cyborg said, stepping in front of Starfire.

"I figured…why just foreclose the mortgage when you can bring down the house?' Torment said. "…I don't know what I just said either. One moment." Torment smacked the side of his head. "There, that realigned the neurons. I don't know what neurons are but I'm being told they're re-aligned."

"…you don't have a clue how half your stuff works, does it?" Beast Boy said, appearing from behind Cyborg as well.

"It works. That's all I need to know." Torment said. "…why don't YOU give up?"

All three of the remaining core Titans stared at him in silence.

"…you should know why I don't." Torment said. "It has nothing to do with strength or pride. I've made a commitment here. If I give up…the master will be furious. Not just at me, you know. At Marissa Mori too. She built me, she was tasked to make me the ultimate war machine. What's it going to say about her work if I just go down on my knees and beg for mercy? You think you're the only ones fighting for someone? You really don't get how the world works, do you?"

"Doesn't mean you automatically do." Cyborg said.

"If you even think at all." Starfire added.

"Yeah…if you really care about Marissa…why are you siding with the guy who's gonna hurt her if YOU fail?"

"…because the world's not black and white." Torment said. "Or maybe the shades just don't fall where you think. Or maybe they don't any more. Otherwise…well, where are the rest of the Titans? Where's your army of friends? Heck…your leader's nowhere to be found, and your team's dark side just went dark side. I don't care how much power your trio has. On this battlefield, I'm Number One."

Cyborg cocked his head, and as he did, he switched on the talk function of the private channel inside his cybernetic skull. It had relayed what Torment had been saying the past minute to the communicators of the Titans who weren't standing beside him, while at the same time finishing up its analysis the latest data Cyborg had acquired from how he and Starfire had blasted the villain in their last attack.

_All right guys…_Cyborg thought, though it would come out as audio for his teammates. He did not think Torment was smart enough to be scanning for such things; if he was, he might have checked to see if the other four Titans hadn't run off to reinforce Raven. _I got nothing set in stone, but…this guy's shielding is ridiculous. I think, however, THINK…that our penetration of it is getting better. The bad news is, I'm not sure what would be needed to properly disable him for good. If anyone has any ideas, I'm listening._

Silence.

And then six beeps sounded in Cyborg's head, in a one-four-one pattern. Cyborg's initial reaction was shocked surprise that anyone remembered his morse-esque codes. The one he had just been given was simple: hold the line, just a bit longer. What was left unsaid was that whatever this request was for, it was hoped to be big enough to justify it.

Cyborg glanced at his two teammates on either side of him. The look they shared was enough to let them know what was needed.

"You know…it's just not right." Torment said, briefly framing the three Titans with his fingers. "Robin and Raven should really be here. At least Robin. It just throws off the whole full circle vibe."

"…dude, you weren't there either!" Beast Boy said.

"Semantics." Torment said.

"I will also point out Torment lost that day." Starfire said.

"SEMANTICS." Torment repeated, a dangerous edge in his voice. "Well then…original Titans. All of you together at the same time didn't work. Dancing around me didn't work. Dirty tricks didn't work. Overwhelming rage at losing a teammate didn't work. What's left then? Calling for help? Suicide attack? Or maybe just more of the same?" Torment said, smiling through bloody teeth. "I guess what I'm trying to say, Titans…is which one of you will be the first to go?"

"…maybe I should use my new bowel disruptor weapon." Cyborg said, manifesting an unusual cannon. "Because you are just FULL of SHIT."

"…I do not think that's what he meant by the word go, Friend Cyborg." Starfire said. She was still angry, still in terrible pain in all ways, and she knew what the odds before them were. Yet…she could not help but speak like the group was facing yet another bunch of bank robbers. Gallows humor persisted in all walks of tragedy.

"You see what I have to put up with here when they try and make with the banter?" Beast Boy said, gesturing at his two companions. Torment stared…and then he flicked his eye behind him.

Which is exactly what Beast Boy had wanted. He'd made Torment think they were trying to distract him, and he'd swallowed the bait. As one, they went forward.

In the chaos of the renewed combat, the vibrations beneath their feet were lost.

* * *

Screaming.

Ever since the fall, ever since the red, she'd been screaming. Inside her head, where no one could hear. Her corruption had been worth it until the Lord had successfully opened the Foreverwhere, offered the power it could grant to Trigon's blood, power to return and wreck even greater havoc than the Lord could. Her father, after all, had laid waste to a universe. The Lord just wanted one world.

So she'd risen up, tried to throw up chains, place some kind of restraint on the monster she'd become for the sake of revenge. Her other side had resisted, but not as well as it could have; she hadn't held it at bay all her life without learning a trick or three. At times, she'd even achieved a near-perfect balance, her own powers reinforced by Trigon's near-invincibility.

But this inward battle had weaknesses. Raven had spent so long with the Lord on the other foot that the idea he could make up all the ground again would have been hard to accept. Raven WOULD have accepted it, though…but to the monster she'd made of herself, it was inconceivable.

The Lord had used it. The fact that he would was expected, but Raven's awakened self had little ability to prepare for it, chinks in her armor she refused to believe was there. All of it had been designed to exploit those holes. The focus on the Noel-clone, even making one of his own. Defending his minion from her own wild destructive efforts, even if it was just a property issue. The false Robin.

The basement.

It wasn't really a traditional basement, moreso a natural cavern the Lord had reworked for his own purposes. To the average human eye, there was nothing there except black, polished rock. There was also no light whatsoever, save what Raven emitted with her unleashed demonic powers.

To those blessed, and cursed, it was both torture chamber and abattoir, as the spirits of Povelgia thrashed, jerked, and screamed on bindings that were part barbed wire and part hangman's noose. Thousands upon thousands upon thousands of them, their deaths having been so cruel and unjust that they'd been bound to the island's soil and rock. The abrupt entrance of the pair of demigods had not quieted them; the Lord had sealed Raven's ears when he'd struck her in the sky, waiting for the appropriate moment. To him, the screams were both music and wine, as easily dismissed as a light breeze.

Raven, on the other hand, even having given mostly into her father, felt the mass of suffering slam against her empathy powers like a falling meteor. She fought back, doing her best not to collapse, to maintain her defenses if the Lord tried to sucker-punch her in a more literal fashion. He didn't. Instead he just stood, and watching, even as the specters howled through the depths.

"…oh you bastard…you BASTARD…" Raven managed to spit out. It wasn't working. She was being overwhelmed.

"Come off it, halfbreed. If we'd never crossed paths, chances are you'd have never heard of this island and its people, and it would have been left abandoned for them to suffer in a vacuum until doomsday. At least this way, they're being productive." The Lord said, holding up a hand, black and white sparks dancing from it. "You know, I was a little…"

Raven hunched over and then threw her arms out, her own howl mixing with the screams of the dead around her. For a moment, her red skin had seemed faded, the second pair of eyes on her head beginning to vanish, but with her own demonic cry, those elements came roaring right back.

"Monster…!" Raven hissed, her voice now underscored with a sound that could be best described as a rake being dragged along a giant plane of glass.

"Then again…" The Lord said, and fired the sparks at Raven. With one wave of her hand, Raven dispelled the attack, and then with a thrust of her other hand, she was behind the Lord.

"I'll drag you to hell myself." Raven said, and clenched her fist. Hellfire exploded within the Lord's very being, his body blowing apart at multiple points. Whirling around and raking out with her nails, Raven sent dark claws ripping through the black remains, trying to tear them to nothing. The black laser beam was dodged by her snapping her head aside, but even that gave the Lord enough time to reform, hellfire burning both within and without.

"WHAT WOULD YOU KNOW OF DAMNATION?" The Lord snarled, and spheres of black and red fire flew from his body. Raven flew backwards as they erupted into a pillar of flame…the Lord flying right through it and driving blazing fists into his enemy. "If you honestly think hell is anything like you believe, THEN YOU ARE QUITE-!"

The Lord slashed his left hand in an upward backwards chop across Raven's face.

"SADLY!"

The Lord followed the momentum of the move by turning it into a spin, which brought his right arm along with him, curled in as he slammed the point of his elbow into Raven's chin.

"_**MISTAKEN!"**_

The Lord completed his 360 spin and slammed his left fist into Raven's face in a uppercut-esque backhand, an explosion of dark energies blasting her across the room. She turned her tumble into a landing almost immediately, the burns on her face fading away a second later.

"Right back to these tired arguments. I'd say you're disappointing, Lord, but that's not true. You're just…tiresome." Raven said.

"I see where you're coming from. You bore me as well." The Lord said, slamming his hands together, even as the shrieks of the room built to a crescendo and his cloaks flared up. "Let me hand this off."

Abhorred usually took humanoid forms. The ones that came out of the Lord's cloaks looked more like humans who had been forced through a garbage disposal and then yanked back into a crude mobile shape, all jagged edges and screaming mouths, the Lord literally transforming the pain of the ghosts around him into soldiers the same way he'd used their agonies to help in ripping open a path to the Foreverwhere. Raven sneered and then manifested her own jagged edges, forming both red energy blades and black claws as she ran forward and ripped through the Abhorred. Her outfit and face received numerous scratches, but Raven ignored them, leaping for the Lord before he blurred away. The next Abhorred were a mass of twisting tentacles with a stinger-like protrusion at each end. Raven blew them apart before they got close. The Lord teleported anew, slashing symbols in the air before his cloaks flared up again, shadow figures flying out and merging into a horror that was part crushing hand, part ripping maw, and part sewn-together mass of corpses, the wretched fusion charging forward with impossible speed and grabbing onto Raven, giant fingers trying to crush her even as teeth in the palm tried to devour her alive.

Raven didn't just escape the grip, she eliminated it outright, a pulse of power blowing off the Abhorred-thing's fingers before she finished it with a downward slash of energy. Turning her burning gaze to the Lord, she awaited the next assault.

The Lord gestured again…and warped behind her, swinging out with his form-sword.

Raven caught it in her hand.

So the Lord punched her in the stomach. Another explosion of energy blew Raven across the room.

She vanished in mid-flight. The room plunged into absolute darkness.

When the light returned, the Lord was thrashing in the grip of a thousand claw strikes, all delivered at once, ripping through his body and the floor fifty feet around the Lord. Raven's ripping void opened up at the Lord's feet, and she surged upward and slammed into the Lord with both hands, smashing him up several floors before she whirled and threw him against the nearest wall. A potent crimson blast blew up what the Lord's impact hadn't, collapsing it on him.

"…what masterful defensive magicks…to endure blows like that even now…or did you become a Kryptonian when I wasn't looking?" The Lord said, phasing up through the rubble…to find Raven holding her hands in front of her, her fingers twisting in impossible angles as she manifesting a clear sphere in front of her.

"Do you know what destroyed Krypton?" Raven said. "ITS OWN STAR."

And Raven reached into the deepest depths of her father's power, and made one.

For a moment. One tiny, brief moment. The fact that she came one second away from scouring away everything on the island (including her friends) was all worth it for the Lord's face, which went from arrogant assurance to absolute terror before the overwhelming tide of heat and light washed it away.

The entire tower level, as well as the ones above and below it, instantly turned to ash before Raven snuffed out the miniature star. The towers closest to it were instantly scorched black, and even in the heat of their battles, Robin and Marissa and Torment and the Titans were briefly aware of an intense surge of heat blasting over them. In truth, if Etemenanki didn't have so many magical defenses woven into it, the attack may very well have done more harm, much more harm.

Ironically, it was much like when the Lord had tried to kill his enemies with a black hole. Except the Lord had no mirror to hide away in.

When the remains of the tower finished collapsed on them, Raven pushed her way up through the rubble herself, black and red energy arching across her face and body. The smile she wore on her face was like nothing she had ever shown, nothing she could have EVER shown. It spoke of horrors just beginning…

When rubble started to move in front of her as well, her face locked up. It was a truly strange expression, like incomprehension had crashed into expectation halfway through its making. The faded, misty darkness barely managed to put itself back together in a humanoid form, the Lord not even forming a face beyond two faintly glowing points as eyes.

"That…the best you can do…child?" The Lord spat out. Raven raised a hand and blasted red arching beams of energy through the Lord. He reformed again, a touch slower, but still.

"Taunt all you want. You're broken. Again." Raven said.

"No…I am true. True to myself…which is why I live…Raven of Azaroth." The Lord said. "You could have sustained that star…could have annihilated me…but you didn't. You stopped it before it could finish…because you knew what would happen if you didn't. You couldn't abide the idea that your friends could die…stupid, STUPID woman…you can't beat me. You can't even decide who YOU are."

Raven's four eyes alit with rage, and red mist exploded up from around her as she floated up.

"I AM YOUR DESTROYER." Raven thundered, her body vanishing into the form of a giant, blood-red bird. "THAT IS ALL THAT MATTERS. YOU FAIL. FAIL AND LAMENT AND _**DIE!**_"

The Lord seemed to retreat backwards, but he did not make it far before the bird fell on him, dragging him into its mass with crimson claws.

"You condemn OTHERS for flaws, failings, intellectual fallacies! You insist you have the wisdom to properly guide the world! Yet you indulge in overwrought, in-depth sadism, you take delight in not just harming your enemies but torturing them, YOU PURPOSELY DRAW OUT BATTLES TO LENGTHEN THEIR PAIN. YOU THINK YOU ARE TEACHING THEM SOME DIVINE TRUTH! YOU BELIEVE YOUR OWN LIES SO DEEPLY REALITY WARPS AROUND THEM! YOU ARE EXACTLY WHAT YOU BELIEVE _**WE **_ARE! A WORTHLESS, IDIOTIC FAILURE!" Raven roared, as she ripped into the Lord on an atomic and metaphysical level. "IF YOU WILL NOT REALIZE IT, I WILL FORCE IT ON YOU! AND I WILL LAUGH AS YOU BREAK!"

…_**YOU?**_

Black energy erupted up around Raven's ascended-corrupted soulself.

_**No, child. You are the reason you lose. You held back because you feared what the Foreverwhere could do. You let yourself be struck by the fact you nearly killed my minion in your outrage. You took your greatest weapon and you cast it aside, because you feared for your friends! You love, LOVED, Noel Collins, even NOW. You think that is anything what Trigon the Terrible IS? Do you really think I killed your love just to make you SUFFER?**_

"…no." Raven said, both as an answer and a realization.

_**YOU spent a lifetime trying to keep this away. YOU spent your whole life saying you were not the product of the blood that spawned you. You, upon being freed of the burdens of it, chose the opposite of what your father was. Love. Camaraderie. Hope. You…did so much with those. Even after I turned them against you. But you showed me…I KNEW…that it didn't matter in the end, because part of YOU would ensure you'd destroy those things. Not fully…but just enough to do the unthinkable. All I had to do was invoke it. You are not Trigon's daughter, Raven of Azaroth. Be proud. And despair.**_

_**Because I have no such contradictions. You forgot, even when I repeated history, even when you REMEMBERED. I used Trigon's truth to remake myself. I have never wavered.**_

_**You cannot use this power. Not truly. Oh, the folly in not realizing it…**_

The chaotic red bird vanished briefly, showing Raven once more, as she grabbed at her face and screamed to the heavens. A dark hand erupted from within her, grabbing onto her face in turn, and then scarlet and ebony merged together in a violent maelstrom.

Raven fell out of it, human once again, all aspects of her father gone, her costume a shredded mess. The maelstrom transformed into a tornado, and then surged down to reform into the Lord, his shadow body swallowing the last of the crimson rage. A second after his mouth reformed, the Lord smirked with one corner of it.

"Like I said before. When we last spoke. That's why I'm going to win." The Lord said. "As overused as this particular quotation is, it was never more true. He who fights monsters should see to it that he himself does not become a monster."

Raven stared at her hands. Gone. All that power…gone. The Lord had tricked her…her and the horrible legacy in her blood, into getting in close, so intimately close…and he'd ripped it away. And she'd let him. She'd had him on the ropes again, but she'd been unable to be true to herself. She'd lost herself in her antithesis, and it had blinded her even as it changed her visage.

She'd failed again. Though she tried to hide it, when she looked up at the Lord, the despair he'd prophesized was there. The Lord smirked again.

"And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you."

A second later, the smirk faded from the Lord's face.

The despair was gone. He had not fed on it (though he'd wanted to), nor had Raven used her emotion powers to get rid of it. Instead, she'd just…faced it. Fought it. And overcome it, the Titan standing up and assuming a combat pose.

"…you really won't give up, will you? Like a good, classical hero. Defiant to the end. And a world's worth of words on how impossible your victory is now be damned." The Lord said. "What, do you think you can somehow turn the Trigon powers AGAINST me? I assure you, you can't. They're true to me. If I can defy the god of death, I can damn sure twist the remnants of your fallen patriarch to my will. Do you think I can't use them, maybe? Or perhaps stealing them exhausted me anew and I'm weak enough that you have a chance? Or maybe you just think you can run on effrontery alone. I assure you, Raven of Azaroth, that it will be far easier for you to go to your end without such comforting delusions. You don't have a hope in heaven or hell. So what say you?"

Raven said nothing. She only made a gesture of challenge.

"…fighting to the bitter end. Come then." The Lord said, and made his own gesturing taunt. "Come see just _how bitter _it is."

Raven did.

* * *

The bitter end. Never give up. Never surrender. No matter what you're face to face with. Robin knew it, believed it, and was willing to follow it. There were times when surrender was the best tactical option, and times when you kept going until you stopped.

The Jabberwocky missed him again. Robin did not dodge her blow; he would have needed a dose of the Speed Force to. Instead, Marissa ended up slamming the machine's limb directly into the ground, her computers having been unable to track properly with the machine's now-impossible speed and the mech having hit the floor too early. Robin felt the power surge and dove to the side, the energy eruption blasted upwards from the floor in multiple spots.

Marissa moved to yank the arm up, and found no resistance; the power the machine had emitted had atomized the rock and metal. When she tried to turn towards Robin, she ended up causing the machine to spin in place. The power of the device was now so great that even her command signals were being amplified…

But WHY? How did that help her? She'd trained on how to pilot her machine as is. If the master granted her strength, why would…

No, it was her. She couldn't fail, not with THIS power, after all the Lord's grace and mercy. She'd just incinerate Robin from a distance. There was virtually no flamethrower fuel left, but with her master's power that didn't matter. It would compensate. Marissa locked on and aimed, even as Robin stood where he'd landed, defiant like his teammates…

The Jabberwocky didn't breath fire.

Instead it blasted a black destruction blast out of its mouth, the head's skeleton literally deforming under the pressure. The pressure made all the difference; shooting fire had no backlash, but this unexpected 'gift blast' DID. The Jabberwocky didn't just MISS, the blast ended up raking across the walls and ceiling, Marissa screaming as it glanced her control room before the machine hit the ground, its head slamming violently against the hard surface. Her heart now beating like a drum, Marissa checked her readouts for damage. It was minimal, but…

"Marissa! I surrender!" Robin yelled. Marissa's eyes jerked in shock towards the Titan. "I surrender! You win! Turn the machine off!"

"…No! It's a trick!" Marissa said.

"I surrender! Turn it off! You can't control it!"

"NO! You'll jump out through one of the holes or something!"

"Marissa, I give my word! Stop, you'll kill us both!" Robin yelled, as the Jabberwocky rolled/pushed itself up. He'd fought enough robot variants to know a few degrees of bad, and this situation had passed bad for everyone a while back.

Marissa's only response was to deaden the controls. It would, SHOULD compensate for its sudden overclocking. Re-arming the lasers, she locked on again, swallowed, and pulled the trigger.

The guns didn't fire. Marissa stared, then checked her readouts again, her pupils almost dilating to nothing. The energy levels were STILL rising…and it was starting to interact with the damage Robin had managed to do. There was a reason the Jabberwocky was a prototype; all the kinks had yet to be worked out, and while the robot had protected, redundant systems, they were designed to function under normal or broken-down conditions. Marissa had never thought there'd be a time where the robot had TOO much power…

Robin broke into a run. Marissa tried to fire again, doing her best to re-route around the damage. She missed again, ravaging the wall, and finally she decided that brute force would be best; the movement aspects of the robot remained…

The machine charged Robin. This would not be a surprise, except Marissa had only moved it to turn to its target. Instead, it had partially turned and then broken into a full-speed dash, and as a result missed Robin's form by inches, crashing against the wall so hard it shook the whole room. Marissa tried to further re-adjust the controls…

It was looking at her. The device's head had turned, and it was looking at her, in the control room. She had DEFINITELY not done that. What was the point?

"Marissa! Turn! It! Off!" Robin yelled. He wasn't Cyborg or Raven, but he'd learned enough to hazard a guess about what was happening. The Jabberwocky mech likely had a basic AI that Marissa worked in turn with. The Lord had dumped some of his power into the machine and then moved on without giving said power any direction. Left unguided, the empowering-yet-corrupting force wasn't just working on the machine's batteries and systems, but on the AI as well. Which, as far as Robin was concerned, was like testing to see if a toaster still worked by tossing it in a filled bathtub. "Now! NOW!"

"…no, it's not him…can't fail…" Marissa said, and tried to get the Jabberwocky to charge again. This time, it obeyed.

Too fast. The machine's strides had become so long from its speed boost that Robin was able to throw himself under the machine again. Before Marissa could turn it around, one of the legs caught in one of the holes left in the floor, causing the machine to go crashing down in a mad tumble. Marissa checked the damage screen and then moved the robot back up.

It got up. Then it twisted around and threw itself across the room, bounding up and crashing up against the oversight room. Marissa nearly fell out of her chair again, staring at the blackness that had begun burning beneath the machine's blank face.  
"…no…the master…he wants the Titan…please just…do what he wants…" Marissa whispered.

The Jabberwocky screamed. It did not have any capacity to make vocal noise and it still screamed. In it, Robin heard something that never should have been aware of what it was, and all the horror that came from it, before the Jabberwocky reared its head back and smashed it into Marissa's armored glass window, at the same time digging its fingers into the protruding metal box and trying to both crush it and rip it out of the wall. Marissa screamed, and then half her computers exploded, bathing her in fire and sparks.

Robin's hurled staff buried itself in the Jabberwocky's neck, its backwards pose exposing a chink in the armor Robin never could have exploited otherwise. It did not shut down or even really damage the machine, but it got its attention, its head rearing around to look at the battered Titan.

"Come on, you hunk of junk! Your warranty just expired!" Robin said, the faint undertone of crazy abandon in his voice apparent even to him. Sometimes though, when things were at their worst…you just cracked wise. In some weird universal fashion, it seemed like the smartest thing to do.

The bo staff fell out of the chink Robin had thrown it in as the machine turned around, tumbling into one of the room's holes as the Jabberwocky went after Robin. Marissa had begun standing up when the mech lashed its tail backwards as a final blow, which completed the job of the blows before and shattered the armored glass, pelting Marissa with black shards. She recoiled under the onslaught, but manifesting shields of a lighter-black tone deflected away all of the pieces before they could hurt her, the same way they had protected her from the fire. She did not pause to check how much power that had taken out of her personal defenses, instead staggering over to her wrecked computers.

"Alice…try and regain control…the machine's suffered…unexpected…!" Marissa yelled into a smoking communication device. Down below, Robin had proceeded to play a very dangerous game and dodged the Jabberwocky by standing completely still. The machine had expected some kind of more common feint, and overbalanced itself again when it tried to cut off an escape that didn't happen, tumbling and crashing across the room. Robin whirled around, realizing that nothing had really changed. Marissa couldn't control the machine, but the forcibly-evolved-by-dark-powers AI didn't have the sophistication or 'growth material' to control its own insane power either. All he had to do was stay alive until it broke itself, and do his best to let its out of control nature work against it…

The Jabberwocky screamed again, and then lit up like a fireworks display, lasers, missiles, and general energy blasts erupting from its form. None of them were aimed, but the quantity of the attacks made that fact redundant. Robin had no cover, and even his incredible body armor and Cyborg's shield couldn't begin to protect him against something like that.

So he ran and dove into the nearest hole, spinning around and turning up his magnetic gloves as high as he could as he grabbed for the edge. He felt the sharpness dig into his glove, and he immediately lost his grip in one hand, dangling precariously over the void beneath him as the whole room shook.

A child trained by Batman would have still fallen.

A child trained by Batman AND Nightwing made it back up, JUST barely, Robin twisting and yanking himself up onto solid ground. He was immediately called on to dodge again, as a piece of the ceiling came tumbling down and crashed through the floor where he'd just been. The room had been ravaged over the course of the battle, but between the machine's power boost and lack of control it was now ceasing to be altogether. Robin jerked his eyes over the walls and hoped to any god listening they held…

The Jabberwocky's tail ripped through the floor as Robin dodged out of the way again. The Teen Wonder immediately slammed on the brakes when he landed, forgoing the best landing he could make and causing pain to slam through his body. It was worth it, as the Jabberwocky fired a sweeping mouth blast in an arc in front of it; if Robin had bounded as he'd landed, he would have been incinerated. He spun up to his feet, even as Marissa tried furiously to confirm her requests had gone through…

Robin felt the floor shift. The room couldn't take much more of this, and he couldn't climb on the walls like the Jabberwocky…

Walls. Floor.

Robin knelt down and rapped on his current ground. Glancing behind him, his eyes spied something that seemed fated.

The Jabberwocky then literally threw a piece of its armor at him. Robin ducked, the flaming metal chunk hitting the floor and exploding, the pieces flying across the room and impaling into other parts of it before they too exploded. Robin grimaced, and then sucked up every bit of courage he had.

Then he stood up. The Jabberwocky focused on him. Robin looked at the strange black light seething within it. He knew that, given time, that power would burn the machine out, but time was not on Robin's side.

History was. So Robin promptly did something very out of character for him and flipped it off.

He knew how the Lord thought, deep down, let alone some cast-off power of his. ROBIN would have shot from a distance.

The Lord, likely enraged that Robin had survived all this, on top of his defiance, would have gone up close and personal.

The Jabberwocky did likewise, leaping off the wall and lunging for Robin. This time, it compensated for Robin not dodging.

Robin didn't dodge. The machine crashed down, grabbing onto him with one of its burning hands.

The floor buckled beneath the impact, immediately throwing the machine off-balance and keeping it from fully closing its hand on Robin. Robin broke free and swung up onto the arm, running up the limb and scrambling onto the machine's back as it fought to regain its equilibrium.

Robin put every last bit of strength he had left into his legs, and did the highest vertical leap he could muster and slammed down onto the Jabberwocky's back and neck as hard as he could. The unbalanced machine, still in the middle of stabilizing itself, lost its balance anew and fell forward.

The floor behind Robin had been ripped up in an upwards, dagger-like fashion, and Robin rode the momentum directly onto it, impaling the floor directly through the machine's head and neck.

"SNICKER-SNACK!"

Robin jumped off the machine, aiming for the nearest stable ground. His luck held there…but not in regards to the Jabberwocky. He hadn't cut off its head, and while he'd expected death throes, he had not expected their intensity, as the machine ripped itself up off its impalement and screamed.

Even as it began to explode, it cut loose one final time, lasers and blasts ripping into everything intact left. Robin ran, ran like the devil himself was snapping at his heels, and hoped he'd have something to still run on when this was over.

Marissa could only stare as her ultimate weapon went to pieces. The fact that her master had given it the power that had both ripped it from her control and ultimately destroyed it was lost on her. All she knew was that it was dying, and that…

It had no love lost for her, as a chunk of burning metal flew towards her observation room. Marissa ducked, and heard the horrible metallic shriek as the piece impaled into her door. Jerking her head around, Marissa saw the black energies infused in the piece pulse violently.

"Oh no."

The entire observation room exploded, Marissa's flaming form flying out of the blast and tumbling into the room, even as the Jabberwocky completely came to pieces and collapsed, its molten body burning through most of what was left of the floor before it tumbled into the void beyond, its remains so charged they ended up destroying the floors beneath it as well.

Then it was done. The room burned in silence.

Marissa was slipping. She had no practice in controlling tumble-falls like this, and she'd ended up on a piece of floor that had begun breaking as soon as she'd come to rest on it. All she could do was scramble desperately away from the hole her base was becoming a part of, even as gravity sank its grip in deeper and the void yawned beneath her…

Robin's hand seized onto her two seconds before the floor gave way, the Titan crouched down on a more-stable-by-degrees piece of floor. Marissa could hear it groan and start to give way, even as she dangled over the abyss, Robin's grip firm on her wrist.

"Climb up me! Over me! The ground behind's me's okay!" Robin yelled.

"But-!"

"DO IT!" Robin yelled, no fear or anger in his voice. "Do it…I won't let go. I won't…I…"

Robin's face took on a very strange expression.

"Go."

And then he disappeared. Vanishing into the ether, like his pseudo-namesake Robin Goodfellow.

Leaving Marissa nothing to hold onto but the ether as well.

The darkness above and below swallowed her screams as she fell.

Then, finally, the destroyed segment of Etemenanki was as still as the grave.

* * *

They were still fighting. Still battling Torment. Down on the battlefield. Raven could feel their courage, their defiance, their pain…

She could feel Torment's as well. She dearly wished she could tell her team just what to do, how long they had…but she couldn't. All she had left had to go towards this…

_Beast Boy's elephant foot crashed down on Torment's forearm. Torment tried to either push or toss the changeling off, only for Starfire to fly in and smash her right fist into his face. Spinning away from the blow, Torment took to the sky and unleashed his gravity blaster, but his disabled eye screwed up his aim, and the two Titans got out of its radius, leaving him to smash a hole in the ground. Frustrated, Torment tried to climb higher to unleash further bombardment, only for Cyborg to fire out a grappling chain and loop it around his waist. Torment stopped as much in surprise as anything, but no sooner did he cut the steel line than Starfire flew up behind him, grabbed him, and slammed him into the ground._

"…_are we sure we should just stand here? Starfire's doing the Mashed Potatoes all over him and she has a broken arm!" Morgue said, before glancing at Gauntlet. "Are you being quiet because you're paying attention to Terra or is that a reference you don't actually get?"_

"_Huh? No thanks, I'm not hungry right now." Gauntlet said. Terra cracked open one eye, the glow from it so intense Gauntlet swore it burned him._

"…_go. All. Know. Do." Terra said, and closed her eye again._

"_I think I can wring one last big shot out of this." Morgue said, holding up Dyson's Fear._

"_Then make it count."_

"_Count on it." Morgue said, glancing at Etemenanki's battered form. Despite all the damage, it was reforming itself, just like it had when the battle had started. "Final countdown."_

"_Ah ah ah ah." Gauntlet said, his tone oddly deadpan, and the three went back into battle. Morgue found that, even after all this, Gauntlet being able to muster a quip comforting._

She had to hold out. For them. She had to.

Black claws slammed against a black sword, the Lord deflecting Raven's strikes with one arm. His stance did not match his face, surprise followed by a hard to read emotion.

"…blackbird." The Lord said, and Raven put her finger on it. Admiration. She had so little left, and yet she struck so fiercely. He respected it.

The Lord slapped her hands aside and grabbed her by the throat. That respect, unfortunately, was the lesser emotion. The greater once was rage, as she burst into flames.

"_**BAKE YOU IN A PIE."**_

Raven teleported away. The Lord blurred away in turn. When Raven re-appeared, on top of one of Etemenanki's highest, grand spires, she found a storm of black crescent blades meeting her, her shields cracking under the onslaught and ripping into her. Raven staggered back, trying to stay upright. She felt hot blood run down her body, the dark colors of her regalia mixing with the dark colors of her body. Blinking the stinging liquid away, she looked at the Lord, standing nearby, his own torn cloaks waving in the high, hot winds.

"Thine eyes have seen the glory."

Raven's eyes went pitch black, and dark energy swarmed around her and lanced in a giant blade. The Lord shattered it with a backhand.

"Neither swift nor terrible." The Lord said, and slashed out with the same arm, drops of darkness spilling out and forming into new Abhorred. Raven watched as they surrounded her, the dark creations manifesting various weapons.

"Shadows should fight with shadows, not their gods." The Lord said. Raven kept her gaze locked on him, even as she held out a hand, blood dripping from it.

The Abhorred leapt in.

Raven jerked her hand down and grabbed a drop of her own blood.

The explosion vaporized the Abhorred and drove the Lord back a step. More blood magic. With a mild snarl, he slashed his hand to clear the smoke, finding Raven gone.

"…you can't win, blackbird. You embraced humanity and hence are, in the end, just a mortal." The Lord said, shadow portals opening up around him and more Abhorred emerging. "I am a tsunami, a hurricane, a volcano. I am a force of nature. My truth is marching on." The Lord said, and the Abhorred ran and leapt off the edge of the spire.

Hundreds of feet below, Raven fell in a controlled freefall, watching the minions come chasing after her. Her few seconds of rest over, she whirled around and took flight again, flying into the twisted groupings of towers, passages, and arches that made up Etemenanki's lower half. Just how hostile the territory was became apparent when various crystals began to shoot blasts and arcs of burning energy at her, forcing her to dodge even as she flew.

The Abhorred used the delay this caused her to catch up, leaping between the contorted citadels and masses like demonic monkeys. Raven manifested a shield and flipped around, flying backwards as she hurled blasts at the nearest Abhorred. A few were struck, but others took advantage and leapt at her, dark blades and spiked bludgeons swinging at her, the shadows somehow seeming eager even without faces.

They slammed into her own darkness, a surge of power both tossing and hammering them aside. Raven did a spinning flip and fired off several more blasts, cutting down her pursuing Abhorred, before she dodged a lighting-like blast from below. She turned around just in time for the Lord to appear in front of her, but all he did was give her an amused look before his form blurred away again. Raven slowed down, scanning the area, and then manifested another shield as Abhorred shot at her from the spires, black crystal arrows ricocheted off her barriers, one just getting through and glancing her cheek. The wound burned, and Raven threw herself forward again, even as more Abhorred emerged and leapt for her. She whirled around, blasted one…

Before turning and grabbing onto a spiked crystal spire, using her power to slingshot herself into a 270 degree arc before she hurled herself at one of Etemenanki's walls, her darkness transforming back into a shield as she rammed her way through it. She was too exposed outside. She had to…

The Lord was there. Just behind her.

"For the wages of sin…"

The Lord slashed out, claws carving into Raven's back and sending her crashing to the ground, the Lord blurring away while the Titan violently landed. Despite the new pain, all the pain, Raven pushed herself up. She did not have time to take in the chamber she was in, as the Abhorred were coming.

Raven flew backwards, lashing a claw upwards and smashing an Abhorred who tried to stab her from above. She ripped another two in half with a backhand lash, then threw up a shield to defend herself from one's furious claw attacks, Raven manifesting a lance of her own power to drive the Abhorred away. Two leapt at her from opposite angles; she seized both and smashed them together before crushing them, before flying backwards as more crystal arrows impaled in the ground. Raven leapt up as an Abhorred came from behind her, trying to cut her off at the knee with an axe…

The second pair of Abhorred met her in the air, blades slashing at her. Raven manifested another shield, only for a third to come up behind her and smash her into the ground with a hammer. The remaining Abhorred moved in to attack as one, and Raven made them pay for it as she spun up, multiple claws ripping the constructs apart, the shadow-men turning into black mist and fading away.

Raven felt like she was one step away from doing the same, the sorceress falling to one knee, her breath burning in her lungs and her body burning at a different pitch, blood splattering the ground around her. Just a little more…a little more…

A city.

She was standing on a city.

Specifically, the starkly white crystal beneath her feet was covered in the complete recreation of a city map, the recreation so large and in-depth it even showed aspects like mailboxes and water fountains (as seen from above).

Jump City.

As Raven watched, the illusion rose up, forming a complete 3D image. Her home, cast in replica.

In front of her, more Abhorred crawled from the shadows. Across the room, in front of the T-Tower, the Lord appeared, arms crossed.

"…is death." The Lord finished. With a glance, Raven realized she was standing in the recreation of Jump's largest graveyard.

Raven's blast missed the Lord, the shadow god teleporting up to the room's sole catwalk platform, more Abhorred crawling down from the ceiling and up through the floor.

"…I have read a fiery gospel writ in burnished rows of steel: As ye deal with thy condemners, so with you my grace shall deal…" Raven whispered. "Let the Hero, born of woman, crush the serpent with her heel…"

The Lord's good expression vanished, and with a snapping gesture from their master, the Abhorred attacked again. Raven cut down the first three before the fourth closed in…

The ground ripped open, Raven forcing up a chunk of crystal gripped with a black claw, the upward blow smashing the Abhorred away before Raven spun and smashed it across three more. A spiked chain wrapped around her left shoulder, but Raven just grabbed it and pulled the Abhorred wielding it into her obliterating fist. Spinning back around, Raven pulled the chunk of stone into a tight orbit around her and surged forward, black claws and arcing eruptions ripping through Abhorred. When one got past all her defenses, it found itself with Raven's foot buried in its torso, an explosion of power blasting it apart, Raven spinning off the momentum and kicking the ground, ripping out another chunk of it that took the head off another Abhorred.

The Lord's position grew more aggravated, his crossed arms getting tighter and his right hand clenching into a fist. Even with all his considerations, where was she GETTING this from…

More Abhorred came forth, trying to overwhelm Raven's defenses. Raven promptly took the fight to the air, flying up and manifesting whipping energy from her hands and feet, stabbing, crushing, and striking down the shadow constructs. Three abandoned their weapons and went feral, leaping for her at the same time. She slashed two apart and seized the third, actually throwing it back at the Lord, who snapped his body to the side to avoid it. He grit his makeshift teeth, not wanting to pull out the old saw of impossibilities, but he'd weighed it all, and moreso when she'd nearly had him, you couldn't make something from nothing and yet she was DOING it…

Back on the ground, Raven's energies faltered, but her shields held up, Raven demonstrating a lifetime of combat training in several seconds as she punched, kicked, and threw Abhorred away from her, the glancing weapon strikes not slowing her down, and this should be over why wasn't it over where was she getting this it made no SENSE…

"Enough." The Lord said, snapping his fingers.

Raven ripped through the last two Abhorred in time to look at the dozen who manifested around the Lord. All of them with bows, crystal arrow shafts manifesting in their hands.

The deadly projectiles were loosed a second later. Raven's hands became a blur, summoning brief shields to deflect the storm, she didn't have the strength left for a constant barrier and she had to hold on she had to endure she had to…

The arrow impaled through her hand. Disrupted, the last several promptly impaled through HER, piercing her arms, her legs, her body…

Not her heart. But as the pain, and the cold, exploded over her, and she fell onto her knees, it felt like it…

"_Have you ever considered what you want your future to be?" Savior said, sitting on the beams of the being-rebuilt T-Tower. Jump City had taken a horrendous beating with the Final Night, but much like the human body, human habitats could be amazingly resilient._

"…_not really." Raven said, floating nearby. "I was taught more to consider the moment. Either the future can't be changed, so there's no point in fighting it, or the future is wide open, and trying to consider it all can overwhelm you with the possibilities. I try and PREPARE, but that's different than considering." Raven said._

"_Hmmmm. 'The future influences the present just as much as the past.' Friedrich Nieztsche."_

"_A wise man."_

"_Maybe too much so." Savior said. "Hell, look at how many people got him wrong. Hell…we're looking at that firsthand and writ large."_

"_Then we have to make sure we endure. So that what he really meant does as well." Raven said, smiling at her then-new love. " 'When the past no longer illuminates the future, the spirit walks in darkness.'"_

"_Alexis de Tocqueville."_

"_We really are made for each other."_

How had it gone so wrong…everything wrong…

Including these arrows. If they'd just been traditional sharp lengths, she'd be dying and done. But she could feel their cruel nature. They wounded with far more intent to punish and suffer, rather than kill…he sought to break her spirit…

Raven got up. Up above, the Lord's expression went from annoyance to black hate.

"Why, oh why, does the blackbird prove more acerbating than all the world's teeming _vermin?_" The Lord said. With that, Raven knew that in some ways, she'd won. She'd made the Lord so mad he couldn't think of another quote to regurgitate.

"…vermin…no…" Raven said, blood bubbling on her lips. "I am…death…black death…a plague on your house…"

The Abhorred came.

Raven yanked one of the crystal arrows out of her body, magically altered it, and rammed it into the first Abhorred's head. It exploded in twin with the rest of the crystal arrows burning away.

"I'll kill you…YOU WON'T HAVE THE FUTURE!" Raven thundered, and surged forward again. When the Abhorred surged back, she broke through them like a bullet meeting the water, leaping upward as she raised a hand, a black blade manifesting on her arm as she lunged at the Lord.

He caught the blade, his own eruption of power throwing Raven backwards, but his dark expression got even worse, especially when Raven crashed to the ground, got back up, and surged forward anew.

More Abhorred came to meet her. Raven fought on, all learning and power and echoes of good friends and lovers lost. She fought like a wild animal backed into a corner, ripping off heads and limbs. When three Abhorred impaled her with blades, she just used the fact they were close to annihilate them with a black pulse. More blood splattering at her feet, Raven pushed on.

"You…" The Lord said, uncomprehending and loathing the fact.

Raven ducked under the blow of, and sliced an Abhorred in half with one chop of her hand, and then spun with the momentum and ripped apart five more, closing in on the Lord's platform again. The Abhorred on it leapt down to battle, only for Raven to leap up, meet one, and kick off it, spinning down and slamming her hand, black blades impaling up through the ground and her attackers, Raven spinning up and flying back towards the platform, blood-soaked cloak flapping violently behind her as she charged at her enemy.

The Lord blurred backwards as Raven ripped a chunk out of the platform, and his eyes widened as she closed the distance even as he reformed, her clawing hands ripping for his eyes, his throat, his chest. The Lord phased through her to escape, and then looked with shock at the fact Raven's blood was on him despite his magical intangibility. Raven whirled around, clenching her hand, and the Lord felt the incantation stab through him with every bit of frenzy he'd directed at his enemy, the sheer magnitude of it staggering him. He'd brought blood magic into the fray by opening the Foreverwhere, and Raven had shown that she could play any game…

The chain wrapped around her wrist. Raven turned around and ripped the Abhorred holding it apart with a gesture, tearing another one's head off as she tried to turn around.

Another chain, wrapping around her left wrist. A second, grabbing onto her thigh. The Abhorred around her tossed chain after chain onto her, trying to overwhelm the sorceress, yanking her around and trying to pull her limbs off. Raven shrieked in defiance and pulled back, swinging one Abhorred up and sending him crashing into a ground before slicing another one into pieces…

The Lord finished turning around to face her, his hand flicking the last of Raven's blood away. More chains flew out, sinking into Raven's flesh, and yet she charged…

The Lord met her. The entire room filled with an explosion of black light.

When it cleared, the Lord walked on.

And Raven collapsed. The chains on her broke apart and vanished into black mist, but that meant nothing. Raven felt like every one of her cells had a heart, and the Lord had just ripped out every single one of them.

"…we all fall down." The Lord said, and the Abhorred dissolved away in turn. It was over. The Lord let darkness wash over him, repairing his wounds and cloaks, before he walked over and seized Raven by her bloody hair, yanking her up to bring his face level with hers.

"Of all that is written, I love only what a person has written with his own blood. And this piece is over." The Lord said. "Kill me, Titan? Hero? Blackbird? Can you kill a void? Can you kill hate? Can you kill the night? You know NOTHING of death…but I? I know that you can kill love and hope. I killed the first in you that Halloween. And the latter just now."

Raven couldn't reply. She had nothing left, no strength, no words. Maybe she even lacked what the Lord claimed. She'd pushed herself too hard and too far to know.

"Oh, what? Nothing to say? Not even mentally? Come now, blackbird…you really want it to end with a whimper?" The Lord said, and began to pull Raven behind him as he walked off, dark tendrils digging into her face and shoulders as he dragged her by the hair. "Or maybe it's finally sinking in. Just what you've lost. And how it's your own damn fault. I couldn't force Collins to do anything, not without damaging his brain so bad he almost ceased to be himself entirely. And you still let it come between you! Not just your less enlightened friends, you too! Because it reminded you of your own legacy. What you feared so much, even now. All your meditation, all your introspection…and it wasn't the demon side of you who did you in. It was the human side. So much learning, and all for nothing. The heart wants what it wants, and the heart knows so little, doesn't it? Heroes. Have no connections, and what makes you dies. Have connections, and what makes you kills you. It's no way to live."

"…_what would you know…about life…"_

Raven could not talk, but she could think. The Lord heard her anyway, dragging her in front of him again, fresh blood running from her scalp.

"_You…have no heartbeat…no breath…you cast off your flesh, you poison everything you touch…even in the worst you made of him…Noel was infinitely better…"_

"If you actually believed that, then AND now, Noel would still be alive. And you wouldn't be here." The Lord said. Raven reached for more words, and found none. Sneering, the Lord tossed her backwards, spikes impaling into her back while black, barbed lines wrapped around Raven's torso, throat, and wrists, enclosing her hands before her while keeping her chained to the rack she'd been lashed to.

"It's like I said. Try not to trim the truth to suit your needs. MANKIND IS KEPT ALIVE BY MONSTROUS DEEDS." The Lord said, turning away from Raven. She had no strength to even keep her head up, but Raven's eyes could tell where she'd been brought. Back to the Foreverwhere room. She'd blown it up, but Etemenanki had just reformed it. The Lord stood in front of the portal he'd opened into the universal fire, arms crossed behind his back.

Raven's red cage still lay over it. Despite its gaps, it was pretty clear that the Lord couldn't just reach through one of the holes and access the power that lay beyond.

"…Irony. You let me open it, and you closed it. And even NOW, it persists. I stole your false side, and broke you, and yet it endures." The Lord said, turning around and walking over. "Do one thing easy for once, Raven of Azaroth. Do what's best for the world. Just stop it."

Raven said nothing, thought nothing. The Lord grabbed her chin and lifted it.

Her spit would have hit him in the upper left cheek, if the bloody spittle hadn't vaporized in mid-air.

"Thought so." The Lord said. "But don't think you can trick me into killing you, Raven. I've seen what you did. Clever work, tying your soul to this barrier. No wonder your false half never realized it; sacrifice is anathema to such a being. I kill you, your soul gets used as fuel to reinforce this shield. You'd literally made yourself cease to exist to try and slow me down. Why? Do you think you'd somehow join your obliterated love in nothingness?"

Raven remained quiet, her eyes pure in their contumacy. The Lord glanced away from her.

"True, I could just break it myself…but you've delayed me long enough. I don't want to brook any more of them." The Lord said, manifesting a claw and placing it against her forehead. "I suppose I could resort to the expected methods…but don't think so little of me, blackbird, that I don't know the downsides of torture. After how bad I've hurt you, I can't think of much else I could do, if all I wrought on you didn't work. It'd be fun, but business before pleasure." The Lord said, letting Raven go. A biting line wrapped around her forehead, keeping her head level, as the Lord turned his back on her and took several steps.

"Break the barrier. Give me MY world."

"…go…to…hell." Raven somehow said. The Lord chuckled darkly, still keeping his gaze away from her.

"Which way I fly am hell; myself am hell; and in the lowest deep a lower deep, still threatening to devour me opens wide, to which the hell I suffer seems a heav'n." The Lord said, and snapped his fingers.

Two seconds later, Robin appeared between the pair, eyes wide and confused. Raven's own eyes went as wide as saucers, and somehow wider still when it sank in. _No…_

"…_YOU." _Robin hissed, realizing he'd been forcibly drawn away from his rescue. The Lord felt the Titan's bitter pain over the realization, the wrenching of his heart as he realized he'd failed again, through no fault of his own and likely no way to change it. It brought a slight smile to the Lord's face.

"Me." The Lord said, turning around. "And blackbird makes three."

Robin had been vaguely aware of something in his peripheral vision, but only now did he dare take all his attention off the Lord and partially turn around. Raven felt his shock, and inside her head the scream began. She couldn't control it or quiet it. She knew what was coming, and it was all her fault. She should have been stronger. She should have focused on the mission. She shouldn't have fallen to the Lord's level of sadistic vengeance. It'd cost her everything.

"RAVEN!" Robin said, running over. Despite himself, he grabbed at the cruel wires holding her, and found, without much surprise, he couldn't break them or even move them.

"Don't bother. Even if you could get her down, there's nothing left but a broken sack of meat. At least up there, she has a proper view." The Lord said. "Timothy Drake. Successor, ascender, pacesetter, commander…orphan, tyrant…mortal."

Robin turned his gaze back to the Lord, his white eyes black with merciless rage.

"Do what your sorceress was too stupid to do. Surrender. Give it up. It's over and done. You've lost."

"Like hell."

"Yes, this is going to very rapidly head in that direction."

"You bastard…I was going to pull Marissa up…"

"Yes, I know."

Robin froze, despite part of him not being surprised at all.

"Nothing happens in this place of power without me knowing about it. I know what you were doing, but that had ceased to be of any real importance."

"YOU LET HER FALL TO HER DEATH!" Robin roared.

"No, Robin. She'll be fine. Do you really think I'd purposely damage any of my own property? Well…you know what I mean." The Lord said, gesturing around the badly battered Etemenanki. "And even if I'm wrong, well…I can just fix her up. I've done it before."

Raven felt the black, cold hate bloom in Robin, an equal to her own, and she mourned. It would happen all over again…

"You know, back in the old days, the very first days, I thought you would have been the greatest threat to me. All the other Titans were just looking for a place to belong, but you? You were a soldier, even then. As fate would have it, we never met. And now things have changed too much for you to have much in the way of any relevance." The Lord said.

Robin narrowed his eyes, feeling his knuckles pop beneath his glove. The hate in him began to lessen, replaced by the steel determination Raven admired so much.

"I can stop you."

"Oh yes. Fang shards in your grasp and all. I'm certain the elephants paid any real attention to the bullets in them when they trampled the hunters underfoot, back in older, better days." The Lord said. "Maybe if you had weapons…but you don't. Not any more. All the wars you fought to get here have stripped them from you. All the sacrifices you've made, abandoning your friends, making idiotic promises to Miss Mori…null and void. Nothing left but your own two hands and what you are in the dark."

"…It'll be enough." Robin said, raising his fists. The Lord chuckled again, the pair looking across the Foreverwhere Chamber.

So many emotions. Like that time with the Black Lanterns. Fear, will, love, rage…

"Your master was promised a death that was life. I shall give you a life in which death flees in terror, lest you poison it with its horrors." The Lord said, throwing off his cloaks with a gesture, one arm becoming a replica of a long-shed mechanical one, even as the cloaks took on a life of their own, their mass contorting and began to rip into the red cage surrounding an infinite white. _**"FOR I AM THE TRUE NEW GOD."**_

"You're a banal megalomaniac with a script so overused its falling apart in your hands. The only reason I'm here is because you're beneath the notice of those higher above." Robin said. "I _will _stop you. Let's go."

"Heh heh heh…heh." The Lord said. "It is the stillest words that bring on the storm. Thoughts that come on doves' feet…and robins…and ravens…guide the world. And it will NOT suffice any more."

"Blah blah blah GOD IS DEAD." Robin snapped, and leapt in, lashing out with his foot.

The Lord slapped him into the ground.

"And for your blasphemy, you'll wish you were." The Lord said.

Hope.

* * *

"_No matter how many deaths that I die, I will never forget_

_No matter how many lies that I live, I will never regret_

_There is a fire inside that has started a riot about to explode into flames_

_Where is your God?_

_Where is your God?_

_Where is your God...?"_


	8. Shot Through The Heart

Chapter 8: Shot Through The Heart

_And now the wheels of heaven stop_

_You feel the devil's riding crop_

_Get ready for the future:_ _It is murder._

-**Leonard Cohen, The Future**

"_The corruption is continuing to spread. The rate's not rapid, but considering what's happened already, it going any further is bad. We're going to need to strike directly at the heart of Psimon's tumor. Before the Antithesis gets all the way through." Robin said, pointing at the crude map he'd sketched up. "Going in the front is likely a bad idea. The defences will be heavy, and who knows how many troops the Antithesis can summon, convert, or call up, not including Psimon himself. Going in the back, however, is likely also expected. Going in the sides is akin to going in the front. The best way is the third dimension. Come into the shopping mall both from above, and from the sewer tunnels below. Split the team up, and meet in the middle. Then we kick Psimon's ass and push however much of himself the Antithesis has managed to shove into our world back out and lock the door behind him."_

"_Easy peasy lemon squeezy." Beast Boy said, sipping a soft drink, a slight hint of blood on the bandages wrapped around his head from past battles._

"_Anyone have any objections?"_

"…_yes."_

_The metal finger tapped at where Robin indicated the center of the mall was, the black-haired man ignoring the slightly sour looks on several Titans' faces as he spoke up._

"_Splitting your team is always risky. If the defences don't match up, one could reach the center before the other, and be forced to take up the fight all by themselves. Now, I'm not saying you young ones can't handle yourselves…"_

"_All of us are in our twenties." Savior said. "Well, maybe Adam's not."_

"_I'm the Edward Cullen of the nineteen year olds." Metatron piped in cheerfully._

"_The point is, getting separated is one of the best ways to get surrounded and cut to pieces. What would work best is a distraction. I'll go in the front way." The man said._

"_By yourself?" Robin said._

"_Yes. Hopefully I'll draw enough attention to make things easier for you. Considering this Antithesis feeds off negative emotions, I'll act like a beacon to it."_

"_Being alone means you yourself could be surrounded and cut to pieces." Starfire said._

"_Or corrupted like Titans East were." Cyborg said, hoping that when this was done there would be no hard feelings about all of the splinter team who were currently locked up in straightjackets in the Titans' holding cells._

"_The Antithesis also feeds **on **negative emotions. If you're left to your own devices, you may serve as a power source as well as a beacon."_

"_I doubt there's anything he can drain from me that you can't turn back." The man said. "But that's my suggestion. You try and sneak in, and I will attack the front. The Antithesis and Psimon are expecting you, not me. You use surprise as a pincer, and I'll use it as a-"_

_The metal claw snapped out so fast it seemed to appear from thin air, the point impaling on the map._

"_Spear."_

"_Trying to be subtly intimidating is not going to help your case, Ravensky." Robin said, his face a mask of neutral semi-disdain._

"_Sorry. Force of habit. Where I come from, it makes a good emphasis point." Ravensky said, withdrawing his claw from the table, the large man's mechanical hand opening up along the pointer finger, hand, and forearm as the curved claw disappeared into the cybernetic arm. "I still think it's the best approach. Should we remain in contact via one of your communication devices, or can Raven-"_

"_Stop, Ravensky. We haven't agreed to your plan. Don't act like we have." Robin said._

"_Are you disagreeing on a tactical merit or because of personal reasons?" The black-haired man said, parts of his arm opening up and closing back down as they adjusted, each time accompanied by a chorus of rapid clicks. Robin honestly had no idea if he was just running maintenance or continuing to try and be coercive._

"_Considering how little we actually know about you and your uncanny resemblance, there's nothing personal about it." Robin said, looking down at the map. "What are you going to do if the Antithesis sends, well, reversed people at you?"_

"_My talent is refined enough to know the difference between a person's true self and a mirrored reflection of it. I have non-lethal ordnance and combat skills. I'll use them as needed."_

"_What if the Antithesis commits murder or something similar to rile you?" Raven said._

"…_my cerebral computers can disrupt, and if needed, completely shut down my emotions. If he attempts to use them against me, I'll deny him."_

"_And what are you going to do if there are legitimately bad people in the front?" Cyborg asked._

"…_what is needed." Ravensky said._

"_That's not good enough." Robin said._

"_I'll play by your rules, Robin, but do not tell me how to fight my battles." Ravensky said, the white of his right eye splitting apart, revealing its mechanical nature as the traditional colors were replaced by cold grey with glowing blue lines. "I'm in this the same reason as you: to protect the innocent. Today, and whatever tomorrow brings, in this world or my own, if someone who is irredeemable falls under my gaze, then I'm going to cut them down. Especially that Psimon."_

"_Then we won't bring you at all." Savior said._

"_Then I'll go on my own, and we'll risk working at cross purposes. This is a pointless debate, Titans. I'm not a bloodthirsty lunatic, I know what the priorities are here. I will do what I have to, in according to the situation, but also in accordance to myself. The first comes first, but the latter is not going to be locked away just because of your opinions. This is who I AM."_

"_Why?" Starfire said quietly. Ravensky turned his own neutral gaze on the alien._

"_You should know, Starfire."_

"_I am a soldier, a warrior. I have taken life. I have never once enjoyed it, not at my core. You do. It's written in every part of you. Your body, your heart, your words. I just want to know, why?"_

"…_Because I have to." Ravensky said quietly._

"_Everyone has a choice." Starfire said, the rest of the Titans having gone quiet as the two spoke._

"_You're right. Everyone has a choice. You could have chosen not to listen to me when we'd met. I could have chosen to defend myself instead of figuring out what was going on. Those are choices…" Ravensky said. "You also have a choice of just walking away from this and letting your elders handle it. Metatron could choose to work with Slade again. You yourself could choose to leave this world, because its dominant race is messy and complicated and never going to change. Choice is only part of a decision. The rest is who we are, what we've experienced, what we've done. Sometimes…too many times…there's really no choice at all. What I am is what I am, Starfire. As are all of you."_

"…_can you prevent your mind from being invaded, with your talent?" Raven asked._

"_I've done it before. If Psimon decides to throw his weight into it, I'll shut my mind down completely. Let my computer systems take over. If that doesn't work…I'll do what needed. Maybe if we're lucky, Psimon will throw so much effort into trying to warp me he'll forget about you. Even if he doesn't, you're going to have your work cut out for you protecting all your teammates. Don't worry about me."_

"…_If I order you to retreat, you will do so. Immediately." Robin said._

"_I will take it under serious advisement depending on the circumstances."_

"_You will NOT try and draw anything out. IN ANY FASHION."_

"_Agreed. The situation's too serious for that."_

"_Give me your word. Swear it on something that matters."_

"_I swear it on the people who dared make me a better man."_

_Robin blinked a few times, thinking._

"_All right then. You go in the front, we'll go in from above and below. Get ready Titans, we gotta go quickly. Ravensky, how are you for that power of yours?"_

_Ravensky held up his mechanical hand, black and blue energies briefly surging up from it._

"_Not at their peak, but stable. If need be, I'll make do without them."_

"_Roger that." Robin said, turning away as he began checking his utility belt. Ravensky broke away from the group, getting a bottle of water to drink._

"_So." Metatron said, having wandered over. "Question."_

"…_Go ahead." Ravensky replied with a touch of reluctance._

"_Happen to have a brother? Ye high, looks like you down to the shinies, gave himself to the archaic dark bottomless well, genocided. Left a cool patch of glass in the desert. Ring a bell? I realize these are all pretty general descriptions." Metatron said. Ravensky's response was a mixture of confusion and a brief passing of what looked like pain and rage over the surface of his organic eye, there and gone, almost unnoticeable._

"My family's dead. …I only had sisters. No brothers."

"_Nothing else?" Metatron's voice remained light and spoke with no hesitation, perhaps could even be called callously disinterested, despite the sombre air._

"…_I'm not sure what you mean." Ravensky said._

"_Consider what it could mean. We lead weird lives." Metatron said._

"…_how true." Ravensky replied. "I had an enemy, Dr. Amendel Redsin, he did clone me…but he spliced my genetics with those of his creations, made monster beasts in the vein of were-creatures…they were nearly mindless and all died, and he never got a chance to improve on them. Then there was…I guess you could say he was my prototype, Caine…but he was just a failed test subject for alternatives of what became these. Nothing else." Ravensky said, indicating his cybernetic aspects. "And…"_

_Ravensky grew quiet, the traces of bitter wrath again crossing his gaze._

"_No, not her…I don't think…I don't know. My enemies tended to not live very long, or have very…refined methods. I can't think of anything that would make any sense. This enemy the Titans had that they thought I was…maybe it was just coincidence. Fearful synchronicity across the realms. Like you said. Our life is weird."_

_Metatron chuckled wistfully, looking away before he turned back towards Ravensky._

_There was an odd weight surrounding them now: His next question was important. "Why are you doing this?"_

"_To protect the innocent and the just. It's what I do. Same as you. If evil threatens and I am there…I'll destroy it. In this world, my world, any world I'm brought to."_

"_Keen. What's your name?"_

"…_I told you my name."_

"_Last name, lest you never quite got past that phase in your teens where you made up a cool new name to instil fear in the hearts of bullies and janitors-mine was 'David Bowie.'" Metatron said, taking a moment to look into the dark man's eyes. "You know our names even if you insist on the monikers that frankly mostly sound more silly once you take them on their own. Plus it's really an awkward mouthful to say. Fine if you like that, not my thing. Name?"_

"…_you're very odd."_

_Metatron just cocked his head. His eyes stared into the man with an odd intensity he rarely displayed._

"…_my parents christened me Christopher, but my little sisters always tripped over the name. Too long. It annoyed me. So my mother, to soothe my child's ego, told them to call me by my first middle name. And by whatever fate there is…somehow…that became my name." Ravensky said. The emotion that passed over his eye this time was more subtle and poignant, something that a man clearly very rarely allowed himself to feel. "Erik."_

"_Hm…Hello, Erik."_

_**Goodbye, Titans.**_

* * *

…_clang…_

…_clang…_

…_clang…_

Lemon poppy seed cake was so underrated.

…_clang…_

Azrael settled into the kitchen chair, observing the light, airy confection – still warm – that laid untouched in the table's center, a gem amongst the over-valued dreck around it, saturated in their creams, frostings, and fruit. Trash. A fine – _clang _– dusting of confectioner's sugar promised a sweet lingering to cut through the buttery tang. Helping himself – _clang_ – toa generously sized slice, he ate – _clang_ – meticulously, ensuring that he did not leave any crumbs beh– _clang_ –ind. A small smile curled up on his lips as the taste of lemon-perfumed butter hit his tongue. He was – _clang_ – glad he came.

"You are goin' to hurt yourself," Azrael noted lightly, taking another bite.

_CLANG._

Ryce gripped her hand with a snarl of protest. Panting, disheveled, blood matting her hair to her face, she ripped it out again, the glow in her eye the only warning before a bent and mangled chair smashed again into the window. Another hollow clang rang through the locked-down kitchen, leaving not a blemish on the smooth metal. She didn't glance to her father, and instead leapt up to the window, the air around her shimmering in the hazy grey of a shade. Muscle strained and claws hooked against the metal seam.

In her left eye, she could see them: Her bruised and beaten family. Her home. Everything she had. One of them was no longer there. Desperate rage and grief were on the island. But he was not. Ryce had known, had tried to prepare for the possibility that when (_**if**_) they returned, it might not be whole. Ryce could handle _that_. But as her brain fired and misfired through the haze of the Neither, she saw with a white-hot fury. Noel was not _**there.**_

Something popped in her shoulder and she fell back onto the floor in a heap. Noel was not there.

"Let…me o-out," Ryce gasped out a snarl.

"Hm…would you make me a cup to wash this down, Alaryce?"

Lifting her head just enough to glare at the sealed window, Ryce's voice grew even darker, "Let. Me. Out. I know you can."

"I am capable of doing so, yes."

"_Will_ you?"

Nothing beyond the soft sounds of chewing.

"Well?"

"I do not like to entertain stupid questions. Should I make the tea myself, then?"

Shakes began to crawl down her limbs. Muddled with rage, she didn't know if it were from strain or grief, "Why…are…you here?"

Azrael tilted his head curiously, held up his plate in answer, "You made my favourite cake."

The kitchen table jerked viciously out from under the plated goods. With the force of a speeding car, it exploded into a rain of splinters and smashed cake upon meeting the window. Azrael raised a groomed brow, holding his rescued cake in one hand. His daughter had risen, and her every limb thrashed in fury, with the audacity to try and stare him down. He placed the desserts unto the chair beside him and entwined his fingers.

"Alright. Let's lay it all out on the table – pun not intended. We shall cast away the most glarin' of issues, first. My rules…the sheer physics between the concepts of 'here' and 'there': Countless of miles, I might remind you, dearest," Azrael waved his hand in front of himself dismissively, "I let you out…you find your way there…now what?"

Yellowing, blue eyes – so much like her own – narrowed slightly on the panting half-angel, "Well? Come come, Alaryce. What is your plan of attack? How shall you swoop in and save the day? Strategy! Methods! I wish to hear."

"Let me out of this room, damn it," her wings and tail faded with her voice.

Azrael cut her off, face twisted into a biting grin, "NOT b'fore I get answers, princess. Are we also castin' aside the head wound? The lack of armor? The lack of _weaponry_? Are we ignorin' how outclassed you would be, a silly li'l girl in a war zone? What _are_ you goin' to _do?_"

"Somethin'! Anythin'!" Ryce roared back, taking another step forward as he stood from his chair.

Barking with patronizing laughter, her father shook his head, leered down at her rage, "I see. The best laid plans of the heroes and villains alike cannot hope to fathom their obsolescence in the face of such cunnin' stratagem. Brava, Alaryce! To war you go!"

"He can't get away w-with this!" her bravado faltered with the crack in her shriek.

Silence. Azrael entertained holding her gaze for only a few seconds longer before turning back to the chair and his plate, "Put the kettle on, Ali."

Settled back into his comfort, he began once again to enjoy the tart and creamy cake. Lemon poppy seed cake was _**so**_ underrated.

_...clang…_

…_clang…_

…_clang…_

* * *

"Robin, Robin, Robin…the Boy Wonder, the young laughing daredevil…well, look on the bright side, Drake. At least you won't go to your end wearing those ridiculous green underpants."

Robin's punch was dodged, the Lord blurring backwards.

"Don't care for an assessment? How about a riddle then? When is one higher than ten?"

Robin's response was his second attempt to introduce his foot to the Lord's face. It also failed, the Lord blocking the blow with his arm. Whatever the Lord was about to say next faded as the Lord looked at the blocked kick, realization coming to him. The brief moment of surprise let Robin spin up and smashed his fist into the Lord's face, sending him back a step.

"…Fang sh-"

Robin's fists blurred in, and the Lord began blocking again, his face twisting up in a grimace. Even lacking traditional body language, Robin could tell that between his inexperience in engaging in 'traditional' hand to hand, and the Fang shards that the Titan leader possessed, the Lord was not pleased with how the fight was going.

"Of course, one should never…"

Robin ducked under the Lord's backhand, arcing around and burying his fist where a normal man's kidneys would be. The Lord grimaced, actually seeming more concerned about the fact that he'd felt the blow than utilizing a proper defence or offence. Robin immediately took advantage, jumping and hammering his metal heel directly into the Lord's face. This time, the Lord stumbled back several steps.

"That would have-"

Robin closed the distance and unleashed a barrage of fists once more. The Lord unleashed a noise that sounded like a combined snort and growl and juked back one step before going low, part sweeping and part aiming a kick at Robin's ankles as Robin moved to follow. It worked, but Robin went with the movement and dove forward, springing back up as the Lord followed after him. Robin blocked the Lord's punches and jerked back to avoid his roundhouse kick, spinning around and slamming his own kick into the Lord's head. The Lord went down, immediately sweeping his leg again; Robin backflipped away, and as the Lord swung back up, slammed a potent jab into the Lord's face, knocking him back again. Going with the motion himself, the Lord sprang off his hands and leapt across most of the room, planting himself near the ceiling while gripping the wall with one hand.

"Not going to let me get a word in edgewise, are we? Smart child…though I wonder about your energy reserves."

"More than enough." Robin said.

"Hmmm. I wonder if you'll be saying that two minutes from now?"

"Come down and find out." Robin said, gesturing. He had been expecting the Lord to blast him at range, and to his mild surprise, the Lord pushed off the wall and leapt back down. Landing on his feet with impossible grace, the Lord returned the gesture.

Robin closed back in, fists swinging. The Lord resumed blocking for a second before lashing out his own arm, Robin blocking it with his hands.

The Lord's arms blurred down, slamming both palms into Robin's torso, before twisting his back and hips and slamming both fists into Robin's torso again. Falling onto the ground, the Lord torqued off the motion and sprang back up, bringing his fist up against Robin's jaw. Even with the awkward angle and Robin moving, the deflected blow rang through the Titan's skull. Robin clamped down the pain and immediately moved back in, punching for the back of the Lord's head as he finished his upward adjustment.

The moment it made impact, the Lord spun around and slammed his own foot into Robin's back. Robin kept his balance and turned back around, jabbing at the Lord's head. The Lord dodged backwards for the first two shots, and slid into Robin's guard, hammering a sideways blow into Robin's cheek. Robin, despite the second shockwave of pain, paid the Lord back with two brutal punches to his own face.

The Lord stepped back again, and Robin could swear he saw him shake his head in the manner any human fighter would to try and shrug off blows. Robin went with it. The fact that he felt like he was punching cold tar or that he couldn't tell if he was doing any damage beyond maybe-there body language would help no one. Moving to the Lord's side, Robin faked a kick to the Lord's hip and then slashed out his fist once more.

The Lord caught it, not even looking at the blow. Robin immediately tried to punch him with his other fist; The Lord grabbed Robin by his other wrist in turn.

"Very good, mortal. VERY good. Doesn't change a thing. This is still hopeless."

Robin promptly rammed his forehead into the Lord's face. The Lord's expression showed a blink of irritation, before he promptly let go…

He then phased through Robin. No sooner had Robin whirled around than the Lord disappeared again, before appearing across the Foreverwhere room in another eye blink. Robin saw him grimace, just for a brief moment, and then look angry, again for another brief moment, before his gaze became calmly neutral again.

"Let's forget some crucial details, shall we? Like the fact that I can read your mind. I'm not doing it at the moment, but I doubt you can keep me out as well as your broken teammate over there." The Lord said. "What else? Oh yes. Perhaps the fact that I'm not limited…"

The blast came then, blazing past Robin's right side, the Titan dodging away and finally moving back in.

"By RANGE!" The Lord finished, and lashed out even as he elongated his arm, the bladed limb ripping across the wall as Robin ducked under it and closed in on the Lord.

"Hell, let's even forget that space-time…"

The Lord was now on the other side of the room again.

"Has a looser grip on me-"

Next to Raven.

"Than most."

Back in front of Robin.

"You can't win. You could be the greatest martial artist in the world and it would be the same. And you know why."

Robin tossed off a few more punches and then tried to knee the Lord in the stomach. When the Lord blocked his knee, Robin closed in and lashed out with a pair of arcing elbow strikes, smacking the Lord on both sides of his head before grabbing him. Feeling like he was holding a moving snowman, Robin waited a microsecond and then rammed his knee into the Lord's torso when he moved up his arms to go for Robin's, before breaking his grip, going low, and ramming an elbow into the Lord's torso again. Instead of grimacing, the Lord smirked.

"Hand-to-hand combat is about disabling your enemy, and you either do that by hurting him outright or tiring him out and taking advantage to hurt him. I. Don't. Get. Tired." The Lord said, stepping backwards as Robin fired off more punches, elbows, and knee strikes, the Lord blocking them all. "And don't let the Fang shards increase your hopes. Maybe I can't ignore them, but I don't have muscles to bruise or tear, joints to disable, or bones to break. You can punch me in the face a million times; my eyes won't swell, my brain won't bounce against my skull. Heck, I can talk and talk, just like this, and not have it disrupt my fighting at all BECAUSE I DON'T BREATHE. You're literally shadow-boxing, Timothy Drake. How the hell do you beat up what isn't there?"

The Lord ducked under Robin's wheel kick and danced away a few steps, holding out his arm as he tauntingly waved his finger.

Robin grabbed the Lord's wrist and yanked him back towards him, slamming a palm into the Lord's chest, spinning around with an elbow to the back of his head, and then immediately firing more palm strikes into the Lord's back. The Lord grimaced again. Pressure point strikes. They should have been worthless; he didn't HAVE pressure points any more…

Yet he felt it. Accursed Fang shards. The Lord spun with another backhand, missing as Robin rammed an elbow into his face (again), before leaping and driving his foot into the Lord's chest (_again_) with a spinning thrust kick. Thrice-damned Bat-scions. When this was over, the Lord was going to bring Bruce Wayne back to life so he could kill him again.

"I always was good at improvising." Robin said, moving back in. The Lord growled, glancing at Raven. Still tied up, still helpless…still not breaking.

"So was I." The Lord said, and popped inch long claws from his mechanical arm before slashing them at Robin's face.

Robin instinctively blocked them, leaving his flank open for the Lord's powerful kick. Robin endured the blow and tried to press his attack again, only for the Lord to block it and punch him in the face, not using the claws to throw Robin off guard. Robin managed to duck away from the Lord's roundhouse anyway, taking several quick steps back and wiping his forehead, his fingers coming away wet with blood. The Lord chuckled to himself again, then snapped his own fingers.

The explosion behind Robin drove him forward, the Lord punching him in the face as hard as he could. Robin felt the pain sink deep and then bloom outward from his face as his nose broke, the Titan leader staggering back before trying to get into a stance that would best protect his face.

"Who's the most successful? Blood will tell." The Lord said, glancing at his bloody knuckles. "Another weakness of the flesh. Oh, what I could work on…"

The Lord heard the dull, wet cracking noise, and looked back up as Robin lunged back in and punched HIM in the face in turn. He'd taken advantage of the Lord's talking to snap his nose back into place, and while he couldn't exactly return the favor…

It hurt. The Fang shards, damn them. He couldn't rip them out either, not at this level of power. Any magician worth their salt (and Raven was one) would have woven defensive enchantments into the implementation process. Whatever he unleashed might weaken him enough that Robin could hurt him just with normal strikes, and the Lord refused to offer him that chance. A magically empowered mortal was one thing, but one harming him with nothing but what he was…

That was unacceptable. Absolutely unacceptable. Neither was this.

"You know, I'll give you credit." The Lord said, trying to keep his tone even while blocking Robin's follow up punches and kick. "I don't know whether you provoke more irritation or-"

Robin lunged forward with a body blow. The Lord slipped around him and clamped an arm around his neck from behind.

"Admiration. Not bad for a mortal." The Lord said. "However, the end result is still a crushed windpi-"

Robin drove an elbow into the Lord's chest, and almost simultaneously reached up and grabbed the Lord, flipping him over onto the ground, the Lord grimacing yet again as he did. How did the Titan keep moving so fast? He should have been exhausted!

The Lord could move fast as well, though, and he did, grabbing Robin's wrist and yanking him onto the ground in a disabling twirl, putting the Titan on his back with his head facing the Lord. Robin immediately snapped his foot up and kicked the Lord in the face, driving him backwards and up onto his feet again, Robin flipping up to his own.

"Oh, bravo, bravo. This is still ending in tears. Yours." The Lord said, and blurred in.

Robin's foot smashed into the Lord's chest, the spinning thrust catching him perfectly and knocking him off guard. Moving to defend himself, the Lord was caught off-guard AGAIN when Robin lunged forward and did a leaping knee attack, driving the point of it into the Lord's chest.

"You-"

Robin smashed several punches into the Lord's face, and then went low and kicked him in the crook of his left leg, causing him to stagger downward directly into Robin's upward knee strike. The Lord recoiled, and Robin finished by spinning again and planting his foot directly upside the Lord's chin. Raven felt the impact even in her severely damaged and restrained state, the Lord flying across the room and smashing into the wall, partially caving it in before he fell to the ground, further cracks spreading out from his hands and knee as he impacted.

"Robin-!" Raven tried to yell, but she could barely manage a whisper. It probably wouldn't have helped anyway: Robin didn't see the Lord move.

The air erupted from his lungs with an equal explosion of pain as the Lord rammed his shoulder into Robin, lifting him up off the ground. Half a second later the Lord followed him up, completely ignoring basic rules of gravity and momentum to step off Robin's body and slash his foot upward. Robin felt the impact smash through his head before he was thrown backwards in turn, his consciousness fraying even as pain hammered through his body with each collision against the ground. He slid to a stop near Raven's imprisoned form, and in a moment of weakness that sent a surge of deep loathing through him, violently coughed, blood dribbling down his mouth. Not because of any weakness this showed before the Lord, though. Because he knew it just added to Raven's pain, and he hated himself for it.

Rage washed away the pain, and Robin surged up. Dark, mocking laughter filled his ears, but the Lord did not move to attack again. In the few seconds he'd had, he'd teleported back up to the upper ceiling, holding onto one of the random protrusions from the walls as he looked down at Robin.

"You can't help it, can you mortal? You know full well that your kick shouldn't have done that. Even with the blade fragment. But you felt the thrill by instinct. Victory, power over the one you hate. You can't BEAT me, mortal child. You're a-"

"Person. Which is more than I can say of you." Robin said. "What are you? A void, a black hole. It's why I'm not beaten. You enjoy the give and take too much. Especially since all you do is TAKE."

"Fine words." The Lord said, and lashed out his hand. Robin dove to the side as tiny black orbs exploded on the ground, the final blast briefly throwing him onto his face. "Hope they're enough compensation."

"Actions speak louder." Robin said, and made a challenging gesture…

Only to find the Lord's hand gripping his wrist.

"Do they?" The Lord said, and electrified Robin with a blast of midnight energies that threw him backwards again, the Titan coming to rest near the crackling Foreverwhere, the Lord's efforts to break through the barrier Raven had set still proving unsuccessful. "The thing that speaks loudest is power, Robin. You have none."

Robin didn't bother replying, instead slowly pushing himself up. He glanced at the cage of energies over the white void, and then at the essence the Lord had discard to try and tear through it via brute force, trying to assess if the cloak would try and ambush him from behind.

"And so you seek it. Why not?" The Lord said. Robin turned to the voice, finding the Lord had made his way back into the upper reaches of the room again, looming down over Robin like a blasphemous version of his mentor. "Let Raven open the gate for you. Take the power. It'll be just like old times."

"…are you really THAT stupid?" Robin said.

"Oh no. Because you wouldn't be able to handle it. And that door's evidence is one way; on the other side it'd just be a patch of ever so slightly different white among all the other white. Hell…between being lost in there if you fell in, the fact there's no solid ground OR air, and the fact that without my spells you'd have power shoved into your body until it exploded…maybe, when I break it, I'll toss you in there anyway."

Robin dodged to the side half a second before the black energy carved a deep groove across half the room's floor.

"Just to see what would kill you first."

This time, Robin saw a black flash. It just saved him from being cut in half, the Lord lancing down and kicking a five foot crater into the ground, shards of crystal slicing into the Titan as he was knocked back.

"I wonder how long you'd last? A minute? Maybe two? Just long enough to have proper regrets?"

Robin took to the air, thrusting out his foot. The Lord dodged, but Robin had expected him to, landing on the other side of the crater and immediately running to the Lord, throwing punches. The Lord took several steps back before sneering and smacking Robin's fist aside.

"You're starting to bore me, child!"

Robin dodged the Lord's twisting heel kick by getting inside the blow and twisting his own leg out and around the Lord's planted one, knocking him to the ground before he surged down and began firing off punches into the Lord's face. When the Lord tried to blast him, Robin immediately broke his assault and darted away, the fired attack singing his chest armor. Instead of following up, the Lord tried to get up, and Robin kicked him in the side of the head, knocking him back down.

"…heh. If I was human, that might have actually done something." The Lord said, and blocked Robin's neck kick before knocking him away with a palm thrust. "Give up, child."

"No."

"You will not win."

"I'll die before I quit."

"You don't have a magic gun with a god killing bullet, CHILD, it will be in vain!" The Lord said. Robin just closed in again, snapping off more punches the Lord blocked, the Titan juking back and then snapping out his leg. The Lord moved to intercept the kick, only for Robin to literally stop the attack in mid-motion. In the half second it took the Lord to realize this, Robin put the leg down and kicked him in the head with the other leg. Snarling, the Lord lashed out with a violent wheel kick. Robin spun under it, brought his own leg up, and kicked the Lord in the back of the head before he could even finish the strike, knocking him forward.

"It's a good thing you're invincible. You'd be a broken mess if you were still human. Your fighting style is terrible, far too much focus on looking good." Robin said. "Then again, that's just par for your course, you hypocrite."

"How observant. Yet you miss the main issue; that knowing all this helps you not one iota." The Lord said, popping claws on both hands and going for Robin's face. Robin blocked the blows with his forearms, ducked under the Lord's roundhouse, and was immediately caught when the Lord went with the spin and swept Robin's legs out from under him. Robin jerked his head to the side as the Lord buried his left arm into the stone ground, and then brought his own arm up and smashed his palm into the Lord's elbow. The 'flesh' made no noise, but it gave like a normal elbow, and Robin immediately took advantage of the fact it WASN'T flesh and bone by grabbing onto the arm, twisting his leg up, planting his foot against the Lord's chest, and kicking him backwards as hard as he could. The limb ripped off in Robin's hand, the Titan immediately letting go and spinning back up to his feet. The Lord barely noticed; he was too busy looking at the new stump he now sported.

He'd felt that. Raven could tell. Unlike the previous Fang shard efforts, the Lord had NOT shrugged that off. She knew what that meant…both the good and the bad.

"Robin…stay strong…" She whispered.

"It helps me know you can't have the world. Even if you weren't an insane lunatic, you'd destroy it anyway. Why aren't I dead, Lord? Why are you now missing an arm? Why is it that you had a shadow army, a robot army, three newly empowered metas you created yourself, Torment 2.0, a genius mechanic, and a giant robot dragon, and you had to fight Raven and I ANYWAY? And for all the power of the Foreverwhere, why are ANY of us still alive?" Robin said, finally allowing himself a moment to speak.

"…I expected you to bring your own army. Why did you come alone, child?" The Lord said. His unique body again made it unclear, but Robin would have bet money the Lord was grinding the teeth he did not actually have.

"I wish I had. Because it means we'd be heading home with another story instead of wasting our time with you."

The Lord slashed out his intact arm, and Robin dove out of the way of the explosion summoned beneath him.

"All that! Enough troops to fight a literal WAR! WASTED ON US! And you STILL have to come out and finish the job personally!"

"Are we seriously arguing logistics, child?" The Lord said, recalling his severed arm to him. Robin ran in, and the Lord stopped trying to re-attach the limb to block Robin's punches with his remaining arm. He immediately went on the offensive, firing off punches to Robin's face and then trying to hook Robin with his elbow and draw him into a knee strike. Robin blocked the blow and shoved the Lord back, firing off a quick jab and then a spinning backhand the Lord ducked under, trying to get behind the Titan. Robin turned too quickly, blocking the Lord's upward front kick, jumping over his lower shin kick, and when the Lord moved to punch Robin in the face, the Titan reared back and kicked over the blow, smacking the Lord on the right side of his head and knocking him down. Robin then showed off his own speed by intercepting the Lord and smashing a fist into the other, left side of his head, taking full advantage of his lack of an arm to defend. The Lord was tossed down onto the ground, and instead of dodging away from Robin's follow-up stomp, surged away from it, reforming (complete with arm) several feet away, his neutral façade starting to crack.

"You talk about being practical, and you can't back any of it up. You talk about being a God, yet your defences better fit a dog. You have so much, and yet we endure." Robin said.

"Is that worth dying for, CHILD?" The Lord said, and surged in. Robin blocked his kick, feeling a harsher impact radiate down his arms, but he held his ground anyway, altering his stance to block the knee strike that followed. The Lord fired off a hook that Robin blocked, and then Robin stepped back to avoid the Lord's immediate followup of an arcing jab before burying his fist in the Lord's torso. The Lord snarled and slashed at Robin's face; the Titan ducked and hammered an uppercut into the Lord's own face, going with the momentum and spinning around the Lord's side. The Lord turned into an upward arcing backhand, knocking him back, and when he took half a second to pause and hold his head, Robin leapt, spun, and hammered the toe of his metal boot across the Lord's face, the impact distorting the Lord's features even as it knocked him down.

"I go by history. We've beaten you plenty of times. I won't die."

"History…?" The Lord said, and blurred away, the dark essence jumping up to the ceiling. "HISTORY?"

The Lord clenched his hand. Robin couldn't see the attack due to the darkness above him, but Raven could.

"Up!" She managed to rasp out. How Robin heard her, even she didn't know. Perhaps he just knew how best to listen for a friend. It didn't help much, as Robin tried to move and found the spread of the dark bolts too wide, the downward blasts from the ceiling consuming him.

"Allow me to refresh your memory on history." The Lord said. "The first time, you fell for my death ruse. The Teen Wonder didn't even bother to do anything as simple as test the blood, because he wanted to get the ugly business over and done with. After all, who wants to be reminded of Gotham?"

The Lord flicked his wrist, stopping the assault rain.

"The second time? I beat myself as much as you beat me. Other times, I could have beaten you a hundred times over without you ever realizing I was there. Outside circumstances saved you, weak and strong wills. You should thank me for the war in Metropolis; Prime was the one who won that day, and without me he would have smashed most of you into paste. Or how about how I saved you from the Black Lanterns? You've never BEATEN me, Titan. You've delayed the inevitable, what was set in motion the moment you decided to get in my way. The only reason you're still alive is because I have not yet had my fill of your regret."

"Or maybe…" Robin's voice came from the smoke before he staggered out, his armor even more battered and half his mask blown off, an ugly burn starting to form. "You can't finish the job. Because you HAVE…to convince us…you're right. Even as you convince yourself…or else you wouldn't be so eager to SPLIT HAIRS."

The Lord emitted another low sound, though whether it was a laugh or something more aggressive, Robin couldn't tell. When the Lord blurred back down to the ground, the Titan tried to move.

Too slow. The Lord rocked Robin with a punch to the jaw, before hammering his other hand into the Titan's lower right ribs. Robin had been trained to resist doubling over, but he was only human, and the slight reaction lean was enough for the Lord to grab him by his back and ram a knee into his torso. Even as the air exploded from Robin's lungs, the Lord rammed an elbow down into Robin's back, and another, and another, three rapid fire blows that exploded down his spine and turned his legs to jelly. Before he could fall, the Lord walked around Robin, grabbing him by his shoulder and bringing his knee up to Robin's face, blood flying from his mouth as his head snapped up. The Lord's arms blurred, potent black fists smashing every inch of Robin's chest before the Lord drew back his hands and slammed both palms into Robin's sternum. The Titan literally nearly flew out of his boots, tumbling across the room before he came to rest by Raven again.

"Splitting hairs…" The Lord said. "You mean like how your teammates did when they found out what your traitor did? How they knew it was me, and yet they couldn't stop hating him? Wanting to punish him? You mean how he died because they refused to let him save their lives any more?"

Robin heard the words, but the last sentence seemed to happen very far away. By the time Robin snapped back to reality, he was getting back up. The Lord could have smashed every rib in his chest to splinters, but he hadn't. And Robin knew why.

"You're lying." He said, strangely calm.

"Am I? Why don't you ask the only one who actually had the humanity to forgive him?" The Lord said, gesturing to Raven. Robin, despite himself, allowed himself a brief glimpse. The look on her face said it all.

"He's dead because of you. _All _of you." The Lord said. "I gave you all the rope you needed to hang yourself. I challenged you to hold onto all these tenants and ideals that let you claim I'm insane and have to be stopped, and you failed. Oh. So. Spectacularly." The Lord said, raising a hand again. "What does it really matter what I expended to finish the job? You beat yourselves before you came here. THAT is what you are, in the dark."

Robin said nothing, but his exposed eye remained as blank as the one still hidden by a mask, as he carefully clenched his hands.

"Hmmm. Haven't we come so far from the fledgling who so eagerly threw himself at Wilson?" The Lord said, walking towards Robin, one hand still up. "Say what I will about the failure of humanity, you are living proof that they can do…wonders. I do regret that we could never have had a proper battle, Timothy Drake. One where you might have had the slightest hope in hell."

"…You're lying."

"…I guess it doesn't really matter, does it?"

Robin picked his moment and lunged for the Lord, but with a snap of his fingers the Lord teleported across the room again.

"All's fair. The lesson you never really learned." The Lord said, and snapped his fingers again. A crystal in the wall lit up, and Robin once again had to leap out of the way inches ahead of the piercing beam.

"You know, now that we mention war, your late failure of a teammate certainly liked to talk about it. Well, to be more specific, he liked to talk about the second World War. Which of course, he would. It was the simple war." The Lord said, and snapped his fingers again. Another beam fired from the ceiling, Robin losing another scrap of cape as he dodged out of the way of its deadly path. "The war of good vs. evil! Allies vs. Axis! A fight for freedom and justice against monstrous tyrants! The Blitz, D-Day…what was that one battle he liked to bring up, Operation Market Garden? Simple. Clean. A morality of black and white. Never mind that the supposed heroes sided with someone who may have been even worse than Hitler and his ilk, and let his soldiers act just as monstrous as Germany's when the war turned against them. Or the fact that when it was done, so many of those German war-enablers were scooped up and forgiven so they could get to work building weapons for the next war. But all history has its ugly side, doesn't it? Why don't we just focus on the bright one?"

Robin nearly ran into the next beam as it erupted from the floor, and his pause, in turn, almost caused another beam to blow his head off. He cartwheeled away and leapt towards the now-closer Lord, only for him to teleport away with another snap of his fingers and fire more beams at his enemy.

"The greatest generation…the rise of masked heroes. No wonder he admired the time so much. Even with its underside, it was a simpler time. To me, it was the final cusp humanity stood on, a chance to look back at what had created such a conflict and say never again…but they didn't. They'd suffered so much, exerted so much effort, and no one wanted to try any more. Especially since they probably realized that such a task, such a challenge, would leave even the effort they expended in winning their world war in the dust. So they willingly turned away. And so here we are." The Lord said, and teleported up to the ceiling before he unleashed more downward blasts, trying to pin Robin down once more. "Your dead failure may have deeply admired World War II, but this war we fight is not like that one. It's Vietnam, Titan. An endless hell without the green, in which there are no winners. Only pawns and the hands that move them, for greater purposes than any of the rabble and the delusionary optimistic can stand. A steaming pit of self-indulgent outrage over things those who scream, accuse, and condemn can barely understand and refuse to. Only I can change this course, Titan, because NONE of us are getting out of this alive."

Robin rolled forward out of the path of the last blast, stopping on a dime before he slowly rose out of his crouch. The Lord chuckled again, the sound grating on Robin's ears like the classic nails on a chalkboard.

"You _have _changed. Such restraint, holding back your anger, refusing to let it touch your heart or your voice…is that something to admire or abhor, I wonder? But how well you muzzle it matters not, Timothy Drake. I feel it all the same." The Lord said, teleporting back down to the ground. "You want to let go. Give in to the blood roaring in your ears, the red beneath your gaze. Hurt me, tell me all the ways you hate me…oh, and how I have nothing new to say and try and hide it through flowery language and constant repetition. I'll give you the language child, but WHY do you think my creed loops in such a Mobius fashion? You just. Won't. LISTEN."

"…it doesn't matter how many times you multiply the number zero. YOU STILL END UP WITH ZERO." Robin finally said. The Lord emitted another quick, barking laugh, and then all humour left his voice.

It was hard to describe what Robin felt next. The sense of loss, the anger, the hatred, it all abruptly vanished, an untold length of time dealing with a problem squeezed into a second. The speed wasn't the worst part though; that was the mild sense of violation, of someone reaching into something that solely belonged to Timothy Drake and taking it away without a second of hesitation or thought. It hadn't been like this the last time, when the Lord had deadened all the Titans' emotions to fight the Black Lanterns. Robin still had the rest of his emotions, but none of them knew how to react. They knew what his proper, expected, natural reactions were, even controlled and directed, and suddenly they were gone. Stolen.

"You understand nothing of a void, child, and I have no time to teach you." The Lord said, the red glob of mist-like material floating in his hand for a second before he seemed to literally crush it into his palm. "I shall fill it. WITH PAIN."

Robin didn't bother waiting for the attack, instead running directly at the Lord. The invisible force slammed him backwards, and when Robin flipped in mid-air to recover, the destructive red needle blasts came flying towards him. Robin went into an acrobatic storm to dodge; the last few shots clipped his ankle, and Robin crashed and burned on his last landing as a result, his breath and a few more flecks of blood flying from his mouth.

"You among all your fellows should understand! You chose this, more than any of them! They're superhuman, and you are anything but." The Lord growled. "What has your choice cost you? Your friends, your home, your mother, your father…Bruce. All dead and gone. For NOTHING. You-"

The Lord's form vanished.

Robin's fist intercepted the Lord in mid-step, the blow completely cutting off the Lord's own intended punch. Robin hadn't just kept quiet for the sake of wasting his breath on a pointless argument. He'd studied the Lord before and had been doing so even now. He knew his speech patterns, when he'd be most likely to cut himself off to strike. And as fast as the Lord moved, he still favoured certain angles.

He also hadn't bothered preparing any sort of defence. Between that and the Fang shards, this time he actually WAS blown across the room from Robin's punch, tumbling across the floor before he came to a stop. The feedback from the blow rang all the way up Robin's arm to his spine and the base of his head, but he barely felt it. The punch, on other levels, had felt too good.

Raven felt it too. As had the Lord. The final insult.

"I…_do _understand." Robin said, shaking the impact out of his fist and assuming another combat stance. That was all he needed to say.

Then the Lord stood up, and Raven felt Robin's brief surge of confident joy be washed away in a tidal wave of furious rage. In that sensation, Raven became aware of a fear even deeper than the one she already felt. Because she finally understood.

"_**NO. YOU. DON'T."**_

The attack on Raven's barricade ceased, the cloak twirling away and flying back to the Lord. The whole room began to shake as it settled back on his shoulders, merging to the Lord's shadow form, the shadow god fully recalling all his power and bringing it to bear.

"_**YOU WANT TO MARTYR YOURSELF SO BADLY, TITAN? LET ME EXPLAIN WHAT'S GOING TO HAPPEN. YOU'RE GOING TO DIE. AND THEN I WILL TURN YOUR SOUL INTO ETHEREAL ASH AND SCOUR ANY TRACE OF YOUR MEMORY OFF THIS WORLD. THERE WILL BE NO SAINT TIM OF JUMP, TITAN. YOU ARE A BOY, AND I AM EVERYTHING YOU DESPISE DISTILLED. YOU ARE A GNAT BEFORE A HURRICANE, AND WHEN I AM DONE, EVERY LAST THOUGHT YOU HAVE WILL BE IN LAMENTATION OF THAT SIMPLE FACT. THE ONLY ONE THAT HAS ANY VALIDITY IN THE END, CHILD!"**_

"Just get on with it." Robin said.

"_**GET…ON…" **_The Lord rasped, energy erupting and arcing crazily around him, tearing into the floors and nearby wall. _**"YOU WILL LEARN RESPECT, MORTAL!"**_

Robin's only response was to leap out of the way of the crackling blast, the electrical-esque power tearing the floor to shreds. The Lord swept the attack across the room, but Robin stayed ahead of it the whole time until he reached the wall.

He then turned on his heel and ran back the same way he came. Just like his minion, the Lord assumed he would jump, and Robin ended up running beneath the energy as the Lord arced it upward for an interception that never happened. Snarling, the Lord snuffed out the assault, the power going back into a destructive aura.

Then the Lord realized that he could have just read Robin's mind, and the aura increased in intensity.

"You're about two seconds slow." Robin said. Roaring his fury, the Lord put his hands before him, pouring dark energies into a sphere. Robin's response was to run directly at him. The Lord barely noticed, finishing the manifestation and throwing back his hand.

The spread of dark blades that flew out of the orb when the Lord struck it was so thick that it briefly blocked Robin's line of sight, the attack generating so many spears that the mass expanded to cover the whole room. Anything in front of the Lord would have been cut to ribbons; Raven was only spared because the blades phased through her to strike at what lay beyond.

Robin would have died before he used his teammate as a shield.

Instead, he just used _her _shield, having run directly behind the Foreverwhere rift. It was considerably harder to make out from that angle, but Robin had always been good at remembering battlefield details. You never knew when a fallen weapon, forgotten key, or shielded dimensional schism was going to be useful, after all. A few of the blades grazed Robin, but the rest shattered on Raven's protective barrier, unable to go through and strike the Titan.

Robin wished he could have captured the moment for posterity; the Lord's shocked expression was worthy of being framed and hung on the wall of the Titans' trophy room. Instead, he just stepped around the rift and did his best dismissive sneer, like the Lord was failing at entertaining him rather than murdering him horribly.

The grip burned him even as the force of the Lord's impact slammed into him, the darkness god flashing forward and grabbing Robin by the throat. Bellowing in absolute fury, the Lord phased back towards the nearest wall.

Robin planted his feet, used the momentum, and took the Lord off _his _feet, his enemy so determined to hurt him that he failed to mount a defence. Again. Being made of intangible shadow that theoretically possessed no weight or center of gravity didn't much help you if you were too arrogant to keep it turned on all the time and too angry to remember to turn it on when it mattered. Like when you grabbed someone with one arm who was highly trained in jujitsu, aikido, AND Sambo. It was the last one Robin used to close, as he snaked an arm around the Lord's head and promptly planted his face into the ground so hard cracks spider-webbed out from the impact.

Robin scrambled backwards several steps before stopping, and there was a pregnant pause in the air. Normally, Robin would have pressed the attack, but staying right next to the Lord after such a blow was suicidal.

So, in the end, was running away now, even in terms of a tactical retreat or 'advancing in another direction'. Robin had pretty much exhausted all of his luck in that regard. If he ran now, the Lord would cut him down. If he stayed on top of him, the Lord would cut him to ribbons.

This way…the same result might occur. But Robin refused to let the Lord have the slightest bit of satisfaction in it.

The darkness god was getting back up, black eyes fixed on Robin. The Titan leader was moving in even as the Lord began directing his gaze, one fist curling back.

The ground caved in around Robin as he smashed down into the stone with the fury of a tidal wave. Robin felt like every bone in his body was broken, his lungs pulverized so badly that he would never draw breath again. His training immediately assessed this was not the case…

Then another blast of force smashed him even further into the ground, and all of Robin's sense was lost along with his remaining strength. He did not move to get up, he couldn't, but the pressure smashed down on him again, and again, and again, Robin's pain and the Lord's overwhelming hate slamming into Raven's mind and heart like blows in and of themselves. Walking over to the crater, the Lord yanked Robin and slammed his fist into his face, blood spraying from the repeated blows before the Lord hurled Robin back across the room, the Titan hitting the ground awkwardly and not getting back up.

"…_**What I want to fix your attention on is the vast, overall movement towards the discrediting, and finally the elimination, of every kind of human excellence**__**-**__**mo**__ral_, cultural, social, or intellectual." The Lord said, his voice calming as he began to walk over to Robin. "And is it not pretty how 'democracy' (in the incantatory sense) is now doing for us the work that was once done by the most ancient Dictatorships, and by the same methods? You remember how one of the Greek Dictators (they called them 'tyrants' then) sent an envoy to another Dictator to ask his advice about the principles of government? The second Dictator led the envoy into a field of corn, and there he snicked off with his cane the top of any stalk that rose an inch or so above the general level. The moral was plain. Allow no pre-eminence among your subjects. Let no man live who is wiser, or better, or more famous, or even handsomer than the mass. Cut them all down to a level; all slaves, all ciphers, all nobodies. All equals. Thus tyrants could practice, in a sense, 'democracy'. But now 'democracy' can do the same work without any other tyranny than her own. No one need now go through the field with a cane. The little stalks will now of themselves bite the tops off the big ones. The big ones are beginning to bite their own in their desire to Be…Like…Stalks. Not Nietzsche, but close enough, is it not, Raven of Azarath? Timothy Drake? Do you realize it now? You're such an exceptional human…and it matters not. Not against the darkness of the masses. My truth. Your world's chosen destiny."

The Lord picked up Robin again, yanking him up by the neck before pointing at Raven, a black tendril of energy appearing behind Raven to yank her head up to look at the scene.

"Last chance. Break your shield, blackbird. It's over. Doing this the hard way solves nothing. It wins you no moral victory, it just means your friends suffer all the more, and believe me, there is no bottom to that well. Stop fighting the grain of history. GIVE. IN."

Raven could only stare.

"_**DO. IT." **_The Lord snarled, and aimed his finger back at Robin. "_**YOU'VE. LOST."**_

A small segment of the skin on Robin's cheek began to hiss and boil. The Titan made no sound, but Raven felt his pain in her soul.

"Your lover died quick and clean. This will be anything but. It's over, it's done, _alea iacta est._ Give me my birthright. _**DO WHAT'S GOOD FOR THE WORLD, FOR ONCE IN YOUR ACCURSED LIFE.**_"

Raven could only stare. All her life, she'd fought the supposed inevitable. Always told what would never happen. She'd never escape the destiny her father laid out for her. She'd never have anyone who accepted her for who she was. She'd never have friends, family, love. The Titans had laid waste to all those supposed curses.

She'd assumed it would always be that way. So much so that she'd finally succumbed to the worst mortal inevitability. She'd tried to use them. Make them a weapon, a sword to drive home in the heart of an enemy, to settle a grudge and bring peace to her own choices. To lay waste.

She'd ruined everything, just like she'd been destined to do. It was all over but the shouting. And the screaming, the crying, and the bleeding.

The last thing she could control.

Slowly, she raised her hands. Began to pull the thread.

Robin spat in the Lord's face.

After one eternal second, the Lord turned his eyes back to the Titan in his grip, the bloody spittle having actually made contact this time, running down his cheek and neck.

"A moderately bad man knows he is not very good: a thoroughly bad man thinks he is all right. This is common sense, really. You understand sleep when you are awake, not while you are sleeping…Good people know about both good and evil. Bad people do not know about either." Robin said, and then spat directly between the Lord's eyes. The Lord could only stare. Who would have thought the Titan would quote Lewis right back at him?

"…fine, Titan. You won't need those legs any more." The Lord said, manifesting a sword and raising it, dark poison glistening on its edge.

"At least I can stand on them, you fucking hypocrite."

"I am not Ozymandias, Titan, and…" The Lord said.

The realization sank in a second later. He was going to maul Robin, something Raven had just been about to surrender to stop. Raven would know, above all others, that he wasn't bluffing.

WHY WASN'T SHE SCREAMING?

_Scalpel would have really preferred if he could have had an assist with his leap, but he made do, sprinting up on Torment's left side, the Genocide member trying to fend off Starfire's eye beams. With his injured left eye, there was a blind spot, and Scalpel tried to find one last burst of passion and luck before he leapt into the air, swinging his warhammer back and down with all the strength in his body._

_Unfortunately, while he lacked the hard-earned battle experience his opponents had, Nester Weames had some workaround methods. Like a built-in motion detector that let him whirl around at the last second. He was unable to summon a weapon or a countering blast, but he had enough time to swing his fist._

_The impact rang across the island, and Scalpel felt like his head and both arms had been stuffed full of cotton as he tumbled away. He managed to land using only his legs, stumbling as he did. For several seconds he wondered where his war hammer had gone, and then he realized he was still holding it, the giant head having been shattered to pieces by the blow. The remaining stick was so light that Scalpel hadn't realized it was still in his hands, and as his arms began to ache, he tossed aside the destroyed weapon and looked at where Torment had been left from the impact, the Genocide member having slid backwards nearly twenty feet, his right fist smoking as he clenched the fingers repeatedly, trying to get the feeling back in the digits._

"…_to add to the list of things that don't work…one-hit wonders in all sense of the world." Torment said, and leapt out of the way as Cyborg tried to blast him with his sonic cannon._

"_That would be the insane shielding you mentioned earlier, right?" Gauntlet said, popping up next to Cyborg, Morgue taking a moment to check on Scalpel's arms before the alien waved her off and produced his last remaining weapons, the twin scimitars._

"_Pretty much." Cyborg said, Beast Boy falling down onto Torment as an orangutan and swiftly getting tossed into Starfire, who grabbed Beast Boy with her working arm._

"_Well, lovely. Toss Scalpel's hammer on the pile of shit that didn't work. What do we have left? Harsh language?" Gauntlet said._

"_I think we've cursed at him a fair bit."_

"_Damn it!" Gauntlet said, smacking Cyborg's sonic cannon with his fist in frustration. "Okay fine then. I'll invent a NEW curse word!"_

"_Do try." Torment said, Gauntlet's eyes snapping towards him. "I can hear you, you know."_

"_Fine. EAT ARROWS, YOU STINKING MEEKRAB!" Gauntlet yelled, swinging his arm up and bringing the Gauntlet down in a crashing bludgeon. Torment blurred out of the way, and then blurred backwards to dodge the follow up punch._

"_Those look nothing like arrows."_

"_Sure, THOSE don't."_

_Starfire's Starbolt fragmented into a swarm of sharp pieces, the blasts peppering Torment with small explosions. Gauntlet reared back and punched into the smoke cloud, but all he hit was smoke, Torment leaping out and landing thirty feet away. He then lost several seconds coughing, but blurred away before Cyborg could successfully blast him, his coughs turning into barking laughter._

"_A little less conversation. A little more action, please." Torment said._

"_I guess I shouldn't be surprised. After all, why would THAT be the attack that worked?" Gauntlet said. Torment let out another ragged blast of laughter and then flicked his hands at the ground, destructive pillars of energy exploding up from beneath it and driving Gauntlet back._

"_All this aggravation ain't satisfactioning me." Torment said, and twirled nearly 360 degrees before his foot raked across the ground. Rending tornadoes exploded from the earth five feet out at various angles, violently blowing Starfire away. Beast Boy surged through when the wind blasts had vanished, turning into a gorilla and grabbing for Torment's head. He slapped Beast Boy's fist aside, grabbed him in turn by the throat, and hoisted him up like a child._

"_A little more bite and a less less bark." Torment said, and emitting an upward wave of pulverizing gravity, the impact feeling like Beast Boy had been struck with half a dozen uppercuts delivered by jackhammers, the changeling hurled away like a rag doll. Scalpel was the next to charge in, swords twirling and cutting the air. Torment blocked all the strikes with his hands, sparks flying from the blows._

"_A little more fight and a little LESS spark." Torment said. The alien never saw his enemy's foot, the blow striking him at his ankles and knocking his legs out from under him. Scalpel didn't even get a chance to fall forward before Torment blurred to his side and spun his kicking leg up and down, driving his foot into the Titan's back via an axe kick-like stomp, before a blast of force triggered immediately afterward threw him straight back up into Torment's wheel kick, the Genocide member catching the alien with the crook of his ankle, then further spinning and hurling him away. "Close your mouth, open up your heart, and baby satisfy me. Satisfy me, babies…"_

"_I don't know if you're quoting the Heavy, BUT YOU DON'T DESERVE TO REGARDLESS!" Gauntlet yelled, only for Torment to leap away from his punch again. "Oh, sure, you let everyone else hit you. What, do I have cooties?"_

"_No. Rabies." Torment said, and before Gauntlet could ask for clarification several metal bats were flying at Gauntlet, biting at his head and neck.  
"At least he…doesn't have…super…knitting!" Gauntlet cursed, swatting and smashing the bats to pieces. Much to his surprise, Torment laughed again, but the tone was different. In the process of crushing the last three bats in a Gauntlet-grip, the Titan realized that his enemy had found the comment genuinely amusing._

"…_Did we just have a moment?" Gauntlet said._

"_I think so." Morgue said, popping up next to Gauntlet._

"_Shit. That's really distracting me from dehumanizing him."_

_Torment slashed out his hand, and a spray of black blasts exploded everything in front of him, which would have included the pair of Titans if Gauntlet hadn't jumped backwards with Morgue._

"_PROBLEM SOLVED!" Gauntlet yelled, and spun his energy around before firing it off at Torment…only for him to blur away AGAIN. "OH FISHSTICKS IN CUSTARD!"_

_Torment landed with a crash, the ground cracking beneath his feet. A roar of jets alerted him to Starfire and Cyborg's return, and after spinning his arm in a circle around him, his stolen variant of Starbolts and sonic blasts manifested around him in spheres, spinning around his body like electrons around an atom._

"_Come on baby, I'm tired of talking." Torment said. Starfire and Cyborg immediately tried blasting the orbs, hoping to make the defensive-style attack backfire and blow up. It backfired on them instead; Torment blocked the blasts with a sphere of the same kind, and promptly made more of them with the energy he'd assimilated. "Grab your coat and let's start walking!"_

_Cyborg brought out the gatling cannon again: Torment took to the air, bullets whizzing past him before he backhanded the Titan, Cyborg flying into one of Torment's electron-spheres and being driven into the ground._

"_Come on, come on!"_

_Starfire's eye bolts hit Torment's hand, the alien weaving with expert grace through the spheres as he charged back at her to counter-attack, her need to protect her injured arm slowing her down and allowing Torment to kick her in the hip, sending her crashing through another piece of rock._

"_Come on, come on!"_

_Scalpel didn't even get close; Torment threw several of the spheres at him and blew him backwards. Starfire returned and delivered her own kick, sending Torment backwards into Beast Boy's eager gorilla arms, but the changeling's attempt to suplex Torment headfirst into the ground failed when Torment literally put the brakes on mid-move with a blast of psychic force, two of the spheres finding Beast Boy and blasting him away._

"_COME ON, COME ON!" Torment sang-taunted. Starfire unleashed yet another blistering eye beam, only for Torment to blur away from it and actually waste several seconds dancing._

"_Don't procrastinate, don't articulate, girl it's getting late…"_

"_Don't have a golden ticket, how about a golden FIST?" Gauntlet yelled, leaping in with another swinging downward Gauntlet blow, doing his best to punch through the electron spheres. It proved to be pointless, as Torment, surprise surprise, blurred out of the way._

"_Yarrr, I'm a buccaneer and that was buckin' lame." Torment said._

"_I guess one of those hits struck home. You clearly have brain damage." Gauntlet said._

_The Titans leapt in from all sides even as Gauntlet spoke. Unfortunately, that meant Gauntlet was the only one who saw Torment's smirk._

"_Me you say?"_

_The remaining spheres flew into Torment's hands as he slammed both down. The explosion of force and heat felt like it seared Gauntlet's combat armor directly onto his skin, even as it sent all the Titans flying back like paper dolls, the blast having been so loud that for a few seconds the Titan was legitimately afraid he'd gone deaf. Scrambling back to his feet, he saw Morgue unsteadily get to hers._

_The flamethrower blast engulfed her, and for two terrifying seconds she was a blazing marionette before Gauntlet's energy hand snuffed out the fire. Gauntlet didn't get a chance to do anything else, as Torment blurred over and punched him away, lashing out with his leg and burying it into Morgue's knee, knocking her down with a cry. A blast of electricity roiled down his foot, zapping the undertaker before she could turn into bats to get away._

"_Getting upset, waiting around." Torment finished, his right arm manifesting into his gravity cannon. "I think we've played enough, Titans. If I'm going to start picking you off, might as well clear away the trash first."_

"_Sure, just…head out the door and throw yourself in a bin, could you? I'm rather tired, so I can do it myself." Morgue said._

"_Ohhhhh…burn." Torment said, laughing before he turned and blasted Scalpel's screaming form with his gravity cannon as he tried to come to the rescue. Beast Boy and Cyborg got similarly flattened, and Starfire got an arcing red blast from Torment's other arm that sent her crashing into the ground, Torment pressing his gravity cannon into Morgue's head. "Thanks for the laugh, miss. Sorry I deny you a last meal, but I think you've had enough already."_

"_Be original. Everyone makes fun of my fat."_

"_Whatever." Torment said, and primed the cannon._

_He felt the force seize onto his ankles, and he paused to look down. Golden energy. Morgue reacted immediately to the distraction and scattered to bats._

"_EAT-THIS!" Gauntlet yelled, and having borrowed his dead teammate's trick to lock Torment in place, he promptly hit the Genocide member so hard that the blow rattled all the way up his Gauntlet-arm. The last time it'd done that, he'd been punching his way through a stadium Peregrine had thrown at him. He would have been content with a quarter of the damage his stadium-punch had caused._

_Instead, he felt…suction. Jerking his golden energy away in alarm, he watched as Torment re-appeared from the small dust cloud, the last bits of Gauntlet power vanishing into his palm._

"_Tasty…and my thanks. Robert Candide. You were the last power I wanted that the master would allow me to absorb. I figured that when I stole it from you, I might as well make sure you were striking me as hard as you could. Maximum potency and all that." Torment said. "Now…I figure I can get to properly killing you."_

"_Says you…if you could you'd have done it about a hundred and twenty pages ago." Gauntlet spat._

"_No, Titan. Because this way, I know not only am I the strongest, but I can go the distance. I have rewarded the master's faith in me. I've shown him the strength of Miss Mori's brilliance. He'll be pleased with me, and her."_

"…_Nester…if you really want what's best for her…you would have taken a dive with the first punch." Gauntlet said quietly._

"_Ah, Candide, if I honestly thought you could do a damn thing for her…maybe I would. Just maybe." Torment said, and for the life of him, Gauntlet believed he was sincere. "But this world has no place for her, Candide. Or for me. There is no number of bank robberies you can stop or giant death rays you can smash to give either of us a chance. We've sided with the one who will actually give us a place in this world. I wouldn't expect you to understand."_

"_You can't be given a place. You have to choose it. And whether or not you win today…you chose wrong." Gauntlet said._

"_Ah, Titan…you're a believer, I will give you credit. Moreso than any of your teammates, really. White hats and black hats, with a six-gun and a desire to clean up this one horse town…but this isn't a John Wayne movie, Gauntlet. It's the Alamo, and this time, the cowboys won't even provide a good war cry for their efforts." Torment said. "I know you're trying to buy time for your teammates to recover and ambush me again. Please continue to talk. It won't make any difference in the end."_

_Silence._

"…_I'm sorry, did you expect me to do an impression? Yeah, Wayne's before my time and my humor cup had kinda runneth emptieth for the last twenty minutes."_

"_Heh. Well, if you wanna go out as a tribute to your late teammate…" Torment said, cracking his knuckles. "That's a good way to-"  
When the change came, it came suddenly, as the ground beneath Torment and Gauntlet suddenly began to literally shake, rattle, and roll. The battle on and over La Voix had disturbed the island's bearings more than once, but not like this. Those had been brief impact tremors, but THIS time the whole island had suddenly went from overtly stable to anything but, like the Lord had decided to tear up the two-landmass merge again and drop it in the middle of 1906 San Francisco during its famous earthquake. Gauntlet, much to his annoyance, actually fell to his knees while Torment did not, though at least he was clearly affected._

"_What the…oh. OH! Now THIS is unexpected! I almost forgot about your little blonde mud-chucker." Torment said, and floated up off the ground. "Oops! Kind of hard to toss me off my feet when I can stand on thin air, isn't it? Have you gotten THAT stupidly desperate?"_

_Gauntlet's only reply was to push himself back up, yellow energy lines anchoring him to the ground. Around him, the ground bucked and heaved and shattered, hills and cliffs and stretches across the isle giving in to the forces being wielded against it. All distinct sound was lost in the roar, the ground rioting like it had borne too much. Some distance away, a coast-bound cave that had nearly become a tomb collapsed into oblivion. Several moments later, a chunk of the island to the east literally broke off and slid into the sea._

_Terra herself rose up, her whole body not so much shining gold as SEETHING gold. The energies she was commanding, both in scope and in precision, had never been attempted before. She had pulled off a bigger trick once, but she'd had her teammates to share the weight then. This was all on her; the weight of the Titans' continued world._

"_If you're going to try to collapse the tower, don't bother. The master won't let it fall down. Not after all he's done to make it this far." Torment said. "And for all her impressive peacocking, it really just drives it home how stupid you all are. Because floating up like that just makes her a target."_

_Gauntlet lashed out with a final energy fist. Torment dodged it merely by flying higher, mockingly giving Gauntlet a brief salute before his arm transformed into its rail cannon._

"_NO!" Cyborg yelled, desperately flying in. He crashed down onto a heaving stone pillar, pulling every bit of juice from his batteries as he could, his sonic cannon erupting in echoing radiance as he fired on Torment._

_Torment shook his head. Too little, too late._

"_Such heroic nonsense." Torment said, waving a hand. Rather than a brilliant gold, Torment's stolen Gauntlet energy was the sallow yellow of liver damage and cowardice, the shield surging up between Torment and the blast. "Not strong enough. Not clever enough. Not mean enough. Just give it up. K thanx. DIE."_

"…_Yeah." Gauntlet said._

_The sonic blast ripped through the Fake-Gauntlet shield like it wasn't there, taking Torment directly in the chest and throwing him backwards like he'd been shot out of the cannon personally. The blow wasn't that severe, not enough to knock Torment down or out, but the fact that it had happened at all floored the Genocide member, his computers screaming data at him._

_The sonic blast had cut through the replicated energies like a hot knife through butter. It should not have done that. When confronted with this fact, the computers attempted to assess what had happened and then spit an answer back at him. In the second they had, they concluded that the energies Torment had stolen were 'poisoned'._

_Which made no sense at all. He'd played the Titan, pissing him off so he'd punch him as hard as he could, so the energies he took would be at their strongest…_

…_unless he'd been the one who had been played. Torment came to that realization a half-second too late, as he moved to recover from the sonic blast and found Gauntlet directly in his face, having been thrown there by Scalpel._

_This time, Gauntlet DID punch him as hard as he could, having contracted all the Gauntlet-energy into the metal construct to do so. The blow only knocked Torment back a few feet._

_Specifically, back and up a few feet. The strike had been an uppercut._

_Directly into the combined sonic, Starbolt, and Dyson's Fear blast, the triad attack finally succeeding in sending Torment streaking across the island sky in a blaze of glory. It hurt, but what hurt more was the realization._

_He'd been warned, over and over. Don't underestimate the Titans. Don't underestimate their ability to figure something out. They'd done it with the master, they'd done it Wilson, they'd done it with Trigon and Blood and Prime and every villain in between. And now him. Gauntlet hadn't punched him in a mindless rage. He'd recognized what Torment was trying to do, and instead punched him with his unique energies attuned to be worthless against sonic weaponry. And his team had worked perfectly around it._

_The power of family._

_The rage of the circumstances shattered the offence, Torment finally getting enough control to stop and dispel the combined energies. Not good enough. Even after all…their…_

_The geokinetic. She'd been building up to something huge._

…_and there was an extinct volcano on the island._

_Torment looked down at where he'd been blasted. For the last time, his inexperience came to the forefront. Any of his enemies, upon realizing what he had, would have moved. Torment looked._

"_No."_

_In the very back of his mind, he heard Terra scream, her voice intermingling with the titanic roar that bellowed up from the depths of the earth, unfathomable energies that the greatest weapons of mankind could barely match surging up from deep beneath the planet's scarred skin, the volcano blowing its top with the force of a dozen earthquakes._

"_NONONONONOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO-!"_

_The plume of burning gases and noxious ash enveloped him, fired by a shockwave akin to the detonation of a small nuclear bomb. The Lord himself would have been unable to stand against it, and as good as Nester Weames' shielding tech was, it wasn't THAT good._

_The burning was terrible, but the darkness was worse. It was not a comforting darkness. It was a cold, suffocating black, one that spoke of immense disappointment, and of consequences that would be laid. And provided he didn't die…_

…_Nester didn't think they would be laid at his feet._

_Then he didn't think at all, any more._

_Gauntlet vaguely saw the form fall out of the surging ash cloud, tumbling end over end. The thud of its impact, back to earth, was lost in the thundering apocalypse of the explosion. Gauntlet looked in the direction of Nester Weames' final resting place, and somewhere deep inside, he managed to find one last creative spark._

"_Yippey kay yay, motherfucker."_

_Cyborg had been in the air even before the volcano had blown up in Torment's face. It barely took him ten seconds to locate Torment's smoking, prone body when it had landed, the Titan holding his sonic cannon out, just in case, as he made one last scan. Finally, his computer gave him good results. Torment was finished, and Cyborg made sure he wouldn't be pulling anything else, entrapping him with a kinetic cage, locking down his body and sinking cold fangs of paralysis into his mind._

"…_is it done?" Starfire said, floating down._

"_Like dinner. WELL done." Cyborg said, as he turned around, his jets sputtering from the first traces of ash that were beginning to rain down on the island before his purifiers kicked in. He only needed a few seconds to pinpoint what he wanted._

"_Let's go." Cyborg said, and blasted off towards Etemenanki._

_The Titans didn't need any orders. Terra had pulled herself to her feet and then tore up the ground beneath the remaining Titans, the young warriors trying to suck up whatever strength they had left. It was time, the last time, to do what they did best. To plunge into the impossible and make it home in time for breakfast._

_Cyborg took a half second to consider whether to use his sonic or Canis Majoris cannons. _

_End decision: why be biased? _

The wall exploded inward, but the Lord barely seemed to notice. He was too busy looking at Raven, at her unflagging defiance. He vaguely heard Robin chuckle, but the mockery didn't even register, his burning glare on the sorceress so intense that he didn't even bother sparing the brief thought and motion needed to break Robin's neck.

Hope.

After all he'd done…hope.

"…why…" The Lord said, and then turned around, still holding Robin. That fact was all that made the Titans pause as the smoke cleared, their numbers moving into the room, weapons and wills at the ready. The same accursed defiance, mirrored and magnified in their hearts and souls. They had so little…and it mattered even less.

"…why?" The Lord said.

"…another man of steel said it best." Cyborg said, and aimed his sonic cannon. "There is a right and a wrong in the universe. And the distinction is not hard to make."

The Lord cocked his head a moment, and then with a slow, grinding shake of his head, a bitter laugh spilled forth from him, coming less from his mouth than his heart, or rather the void that lay there. Unending, unyielding…and unwilling. With one final sneer, he tossed Robin aside. He didn't need to hide behind any mortal. The Titan leader meant nothing. THEY _ALL _MEANT _NOTHING…!_

"Then let me counter with the _truth _of a superman." The Lord said, raising the hand he'd held Robin with, arcs of energy jumping between the fingers. "What is good? All that heightens the feeling of power in man, the will to power, power itself. What is bad? All that is born of weakness. What is happiness? The feeling that power is growing, that resistance is…"

Cyborg went down on one knee, his broad shoulders having hidden Sophie's profile behind him. Her own self, _and _the giant cannon she called _Dyson's Fear_. Her calculations had been off a smidgeon: it turned out she could muster TWO last good shots.

"OH, DO SHUT UP."

The blast that came out of the cannon, even as burning sparks rained down on Morgue's face and shoulders as the machine finally gave up the ghost and suffered a critical systems failure, was white with a blue tint. With an arrogant sneer, the Lord held out one hand to block it.

The blast was still solar power, and the Lord staggered back, the photon ray fragmenting against his hand, ripping through his palm, fingers, and arm with a stomach-turning hissing sound. The Lord took another few seconds to stare at his ragged limb, pieces of ravaged shadow dripping off and vanishing into the ether a few seconds later, before looking back at the Titans.

They could have jumped him then, but they hadn't. Even after all that…they were being tactical. Even with Raven near-crucified behind him, even with their leader in a broken heap off to the side, they had held back. Assessing how the blast affected him, and how he would react to it.

They had their answer.

So did Raven, and it stole the breath from her lungs.

"…go." Cyborg said, and ignited his jets to lead the charge.

"…I swear, children, I will be as foul a plague on your house _**AS YOU'VE BEEN ON MINE**_." The Lord thundered, black energies ripping through his wounded arm, his cloaks flaring under their might. _**"TOWARDS THEE I ROLL."**_

The Lord dashed forward to meet Cyborg, his arm reforming as he thrust it out. As if on cue, Cyborg thrust out his own fist.

The solar blade popped out.

The Lord promptly stopped on a dime, his cloak lashing out and smacking Cyborg's arm aside, before he immediately exploded forward again, aiming for Cyborg's head.

Cyborg met him with his other fist. The Lord had a split-second to see the Fang shards glowing in his metal wrist.

Then his attention was distracted further. Specifically, by Starfire and Gauntlet expertly appearing on either side of Cyborg and throwing their own fists in perfect synchronicity with his.

"_**TITANS-!"**_

The explosion of energy blew apart the entire floor, an outward eruption of power blasting out from a 360 degree arc. Only Etemenanki's natural regenerate properties kept the whole structure from collapsing on the Titans' heads, but they barely noticed. The Lord had been knocked backwards from the attack, to the point where he'd actually left his feet and tumbled a bit before he righted himself. He glared at his smoking fist, and Raven felt like her chest was about to cave in, even as the Lord's power scattered the smoke and dust caused by the met strike around him.

"_**CHILDREN…" **_The Lord growled, figures bursting out of the fog to attack him. _**"YOUR CRUSADE WILL END LIKE ALL OTHERS."**_

Cyborg blazed in, red solar blades slashing, the Lord dodging away and then teleporting backwards when Gauntlet tried to ambush him from the side with a punch. Hundreds of tiny rocks barraged him, remnants of his tower, but the Lord just seized the pieces and hurled them right back at Terra. She stopped them in mid-air, and then threw them back AGAIN; The Lord vaporized them with a gesture and then snarled in rage and pain as Cyborg drove both solar blades into his chest and slashed outwards, dark ichor spraying like blood.

"_**DAMN YOU!" **_The Lord said, and Cyborg ignited micro jets in his knees and chest to get away from the Lord's counter-claw slash, his bulk showing amazing grace as the Lord sent dark energy blades stabbing upward from the ground, seeking flesh and metal. Gauntlet leapt in again, but the Lord teleported behind him and elbowed him in the back, knocking him down before the Lord seized the Titan and threw him into Starfire. Turning his attention back to Cyborg, the Lord lanced towards him, and Beast Boy promptly sprinted around from behind his best friend, turning into a triceratops and meeting the Lord's charge. The Lord simply phased through the changeling before he drew up short, hissing as his shadowy body bubbled and smoked. Fang shards. God damn thrice damned FANG SHARDS. Moving through Robin had done the same, but Beast Boy's far more malleable physiology not only hurt more, it disrupted his powers…

It also let Beast Boy hurt him even _MORE_, as the Lord turned around into a literal mule kick. Staggering back, he spat ichor from his mouth, Beast Boy turning back around as he returned to human form, Cyborg jetting to his side.

"And I just keep getting reminded of my failures." The Lord said.

"You mean your failure in killing us, or just in general?" Beast Boy said. The Lord roared and unleashed an overwhelming storm of blasts. "OHGODWITHTHEOVERKILL-!"

The explosions ripped through the room, but Gauntlet barely noticed. He had turned his attention to Raven, as Morgue had run to the woman when the fight had started and tried to break her free from the wire-like restraints that held her. Morgue's cutting tools didn't seem to be doing the job; maybe the Lord had wised up and made his restraints out of something less sun-resistant. Gauntlet tried to use his energy talent to form what he deemed a combination of a crowbar and a blood pressure cuff, trying to both snap and pry away the lines.

"…No…" Raven said.

"We'll get you out, Raven…don't worry, we're watching our backs…" Morgue said.

"No…get HIM."

"What?" Gauntlet said, confused.

"GET HIM. IGNORE ME. GET HIM. NOW. QUICKLY. DON'T HOLD BACK." Raven rasped out, the tone in her voice chilling Morgue's blood. The fight was seemingly going well…what did Raven know that she didn't?

Gauntlet, on the other hand, neither had nor wanted any reason to think twice.

"..yes ma'am. I'll hit him twice as hard for you." Gauntlet said, breaking away from Raven and running back to the fight. Morgue couldn't help but stare for a second.

"He really doesn't like him."

"Sophie…go…leave me, just GO…no time just GO…!" Raven said.

"…I have enough regrets today, Raven. Don't increase them." Morgue said, swapping out her cutting tools for her handgun and handheld energy weapon. A wave of black dust washed over the pair, and when it cleared Morgue was gone, leaving Raven alone.

She had to get out. She had to warn them…

Cyborg flew out of the destruction the Lord had wrought, Beast Boy clinging to him as a monkey. The Lord spat more black ichor out in frustration, the liquid boiling on the ground, and then aimed for the pair anew.

He was vaguely aware of the Blacktrinian's presence as he dropped down behind him, and he turned to meet him, expecting sword blows.

Scalpel, instead, just shoved his clawed hand directly into the Lord's face, the twin blades cleaving all the way through and going directly out the back of his skull. The Titan felt, more than heard, the Lord's eruption of pain as he staggered back, but he was not hurt badly enough to prevent the dark god from grabbing the alien's arm and yanking it back out, his face reforming. A black tendril blocked Scalpel's other arm when he tried to use his sword to re-cleave the Lord's head, and the Lord promptly drove his face into Scalpel's own, the headbutt knocking him back and the follow-up kick sending him tumbling across the ground. The sound of the bullet that was fired at the Lord immediately thereafter was lost in the room's noise, but the Lord whirled around and caught it anyway, vaporizing it to dust.

Morgue promptly shot the Lord in the face with her energy ray handgun, the solar power lancing through the Lord's dark essence, solidifying it enough that the follow-up bullet blew off half the Lord's head. She would have tossed out a taunt that she'd just fired the first bullet to get him to turn around, but instead she fled from the Lord's counter-strike, as he fired off a corrosive black cloud that melted the floor beneath it. More of the same poisonous black mist leaked from the Lord's shattered head, even continuing after the Lord ran a hand over his shadow-form and reformed the damage.

"_**Meaningless."**_

"Are you so certain?" Came a familiar voice. Robin had found his feet again, had shrugged off the weight of the Lord's world; he moved in despite his pain, fists at the ready, outfit ruined. "Or are you starting to see?"

The Lord's hand snapped out, Robin lifting off the ground as the air was crushed from his chest.

"I see a weaponless, half-broken child who hasn't learned a damn thing." The Lord said.

Starfire's energized fist cleaved the Lord's arm right off at the elbow. When he snarled and immediately spawned a blade from the stump, Starfire dodged away from the decapitating slash and fired off her eye beams in their own slashing arc, raking the Lord across the face and driving him back as he grabbed at his ruined vision. Starfire hurled every single Starbolt she could muster before her energy-generating cells burned out, even while Morgue tossed Robin a solar grenade and bat-swarmed away to toss off another one at another angle, the brilliant light from both grenades igniting the room and making the black smoke spasm.

"_**YOU WILL SUFFER FOR THIS!"**_

"Wanna bet?" Gauntlet said, and began slashing his energies through the smoke, Cyborg jetting down at yet another angle and unleashing his solar cannon into the black dust.

All the while, Raven fought her own battle. The wires were beginning to snap, Raven battling not just their strength but the pain of all she had done and endured. It was strangely…easy.

Because the terror loomed so much greater in her heart. She would have spoken, tried to whisper to their hearts and souls, but she did not have the strength.

And they did not have the understanding. Her friends were the best in the world, champions and heroes, deserving of the name Titans…but that was not what was needed. Beneath their costume and deeds were human beings, moral, emotional…fallible. This situation should have called for soldiers, an overwhelming force that fired until there was nothing left. The Titans were not holding back, they were fighting as hard as they could, they were utilizing tactics as well as they could be expected…but they couldn't help themselves. They couldn't cast off their hearts…and their hearts had darkness in them. Their enemy had gone too far, and they wanted to pay their enemy back. They wanted him to suffer for his crimes. An eye for the Lord's deranged eyes.

They could not. It was not a matter of such actions feeding the Lord; said gain was minimal and it was beyond that. Neither would it let the Lord corrupt them as Noel had been. It was worse. They had to understand, they had to _kill _him…they had to go against everything they were, in their deepest hearts.

They had to do what the Lord wanted so much, and cast off their humanity. If just for one moment. But, even briefly, her friends might not be able to define themselves by monstrous deeds…

"Raven-!" Robin said, having run over, grabbing at her hands, trying to help her break free.

"Tim no…fight-!" The sorceress gasped.

"They have this…"

"No, Tim…the RAGE…"

"We need to stop being angry?" Robin said.

The Lord exploded from the smoke, ducking low under Gauntlet's slash and crossing the distance between himself and Cyborg in the blink of an eye. Cyborg's machine reflexes were up to the task, and the Lord's clawed hand shattered on his red solar blade, though the impact knocked him backwards. Terra immediately took advantage and hurled the boulder she'd acquired at him; when the Lord sliced it in half she promptly rammed the two halves together on him and then ripped twin chunks out of the wall to smash him between the rocks harder. The stone disintegrated into ash, the Lord pointing his finger and trying to put a bolt of energy directly into her brainpan. Cyborg blocked the blast with his own body, the reinforced armor refracting the bolt away, while Scalpel leapt for the Lord's back, swords whirling. A giant shadow hand erupted out of the ground and pulled the alien down into it, the Lord grabbing the alien by the ankle and tossing him away, his body crackling and exploding with energy before the darkness god turned around and flashed over to Cyborg and Terra, leaping and kicking off both of their bodies before he flew up into the air. His aim was promptly disrupted when Gauntlet pulled his exact same arm-grab trick on him, the rain of explosive black needles missing the cyborg and geokinetic while Gauntlet smashed the Lord into the ground again and then hammered him into the nearest wall. The Lord spat an unintelligible curse at the Titan and then punched a piercing stab of ebony energies through his Gauntlet's, forcing the Titan to break his grip and dive out of the way. The Lord didn't get a chance to celebrate, as Starfire rammed into him with her shoulder and put both of them through the wall.

At least, that was her intention. Lacking bones, the Lord's arms could bend in impossible directions, and he promptly seized onto Starfire's own broken one, fingers of darkness clamping down on the injury and killing her momentum. The Lord headbutted Starfire before she could get him with her eyes, and as she reeled back he yanked her around and slammed HER against the wall in turn. One arm went up, a blade extending from his wrist, only for Robin's arcing kick to snap the blade off. The Lord snarled again, tossing Starfire aside and turning back towards Robin as he landed, fists cocked. The Lord responded with flaring cloaks, dark energies crackling within that sought to Robin…

Cyborg completed Starfire's job, the blades of his special headgear slashing through the Lord's cloaks before the Titan rammed both metal fists into the Lord, sending him smashing through the wall, the Titan going with it. Robin went to check on Starfire before glancing back at Raven. Her eyes told him the rest of the story, and he and Starfire headed through the hole after the Lord, the rest of the Titans at their heels.

Raven's head lowered. She prayed she was wrong…because she had not had time to tell Robin what she meant. She was too weak…she'd wasted so much energy on rage and hate, and now, when she needed it most, she couldn't even speak fast enough…she had to get FREE…  
Perhaps how deeply her situation and feelings were mirrored in the Lord would have brought her cheer, as the darkness god forced his way out from underneath the rubble of the second wall Cyborg had driven him through with a point-blank sonic cannon blast. This couldn't be happening…not again…

The Foreverwhere was still sealed. Raven endured. And those Titans, with their damn Fang shards and solar weapons and utter refusal to die, he kept trying to compensate and prepare and yet they kept outstripping his calculations and utterly refused to just _**DIE**_…he was getting down to the dregs. Even with the stolen Trigonpower, after his long fight with Raven and his efforts to break her barrier he was running low, their solar attacks disrupting his ability to properly bring the power he'd robbed Raven of to bear. His own power was…

NO! It would not end this way. He would not be brought down like a proud stag run to exhaustion by some drunken nobles' hunting hounds. He would be the giant boar that ripped the innards from those who would dare challenge it. He WOULD…

The Foreverwhere was sealed. The jail of the spirits of Polvalgia was too chaotic, would require too much time…

…the ley lines.

The other primary power of Etemenanki. Down at the deepest, darkest level of the structure, beneath even the spirit prison. They'd aligned in a web that would not be matched for another twenty-good years, at best…and they were so potent that even HE'D risk oblivion if he improperly interacted directly with them. But if he could just siphon off a small fraction-!

The humming noise accompanied the sensation as Cyborg rammed his Canis Majoris cannon into the Lord's head.

"Hi." Cyborg said, and blew the Lord's head off.

The Lord just phased to Cyborg's side and unleashed his own blow against the Titan's head, sparks flying from the robotized part of the black hero's skull as the Lord both hammered and raked micro blades across the hardened molybdenum steel. The Lord's body broke apart, surging away from a storm of bladed rock shards, twisting away in turn from a Gauntlet flail and reforming into the Lord, black smoke still leaking from his body. Another piercing ray flew at Terra, who just dodged it this time, Gauntlet being driven back in turn by a further spray of explosive blasts. The Lord took a moment to assess where he was; an empty storage chamber, having once held the now shattered legions of his servant's Wonderland armies. He needed to move…

Starfire's energy blast came flying towards him; the Lord's counter-attack blast, instead of stopping it, was destroyed by it, the green projectile flying onward and blowing the Lord up anew.

"Keep calm everyone. Don't let your anger control you." Robin said, dropping down near Cyborg. Cyborg gestured to get Robin's attention and then semi-launched a metal rod at him, the Titan leader catching it and extending it into another staff. It always was good to have backups for your backups.

"Your fury…has been in control…since you stepped out your door…" The Lord said as the smoke cleared, the dark god struggling to fill up the hole in his chest. "You will yet learn…you cannot match me…in rage…"

Beast Boy transformed into a giant prehistoric avian and thundered towards the Lord, his massive hooked beak snapping in fury. The shadow god did not look impressed.

"Hmmm. _Gastornis parisiensis. _Well, if you so dearly want to be cut from the food chain like IT was-!" The Lord said, and lashed out with a blade of shadow. Beast Boy's bird form showed remarkable grace, ducking beneath the attack and lashing out with its beak again. The Lord punched the attack away, Beast Boy stumbling and then transforming again, this time to a horse-sized beast with jaws like an alligator's.

"_Hyaenondon gigas, _are we going for a theme?" The Lord said, dodging away from Beast Boy's repeated bites. The changeling's next form towered over the Lord, its gigantic hands like clawed steam shovels. It was, unfortunately, about as fast as a steam shovel as well, the Lord dodging away from Beast Boy's roundhouse swipes. "_Megatherium americanum._"

The Lord blurred away from the changeling's final swing, his hands flying out and sending blasts exploding across the room, driving back the Titans who had tried to flank him. He hadn't gotten THAT distracted by his palaeontology.

"Why don't you make like the rest of your fellows? Become an ostrich and bury your head in the sand." The Lord said. Beast Boy responded by turning into what looked like a cross between a grizzly bear, a wolf, and something out of a fantasy novel, three foot jaws even larger than the _Hyaenondon _lunging for the Lord's form.

The Lord's hands stopped the bite dead in its tracks, cold fingers of shadow seizing onto the upper and lower jaws, holding the enormous mandibles open like the Lord was about to perform a circus trick.

"_Andrewsarchus mongolianis_. I applaud you for at least giving me interesting choices, futile as they are." The Lord said. "Fitting forms. Just like you heroes. YOU'RE ALL EXTINCT."

The Lord lifted Beast Boy up by his jaws like he was a puppy, but Beast Boy refused to stay carried, transforming back to normal, leaving him dangling with the Lord's hands clutched around his face. Transforming into a monkey, Beast Boy slipped free before the Lord could tighten his grip, further transforming into a kangaroo and driving both his feet into the Lord's face before he landed nearby. The Lord staggered back a step before he fixed Beast Boy with a look of black enmity.

"…vermin." The Lord said, and tossed out a black orb that bounced along the ground before going off like a grenade, black fire washing over Beast Boy.

A second later, the shapeshifter's form loomed out of the flames, the alien creature that emerged bearing similarities to an elephant in size, body shape, and particularly in the four dense, sharp bone tusk that sought to gore the Lord right through his destroying flame.

The Lord stopped Beast Boy in his tracks like he was the size of the creatures he'd just called him.

"You have learned _**NOTHING**_." The Lord said, eyes blazing as he held Beast Boy with shadow energies via his tusks and head.

The grenade rolled between Beast Boy's legs and stopped at the Lord's feet.

"Neither have you." Morgue said, and the solar energies exploded from the device, driving the Lord back with a snarling roar, his body wracked with agony and locked into solid form. Beast Boy slashed at him with his tusks, but despite his pain the Lord dodged backwards and to the right, energy crackling in his palm.

Scalpel was like a shadow himself, slipping around Beast Boy's side before grabbing onto his tusks and using them as a brace, both leaping and spinning forward and planting his heel into the Lord's neck. More black mist sprayed, but the Lord called it back to him and formed it into a scimitar, slashing repeatedly at the alien as he ducked and dodged. The Lord whirled around, his back to Beast Boy, his ragged cloaks manifesting to blades to stab at the Titan's giant green form. Scalpel promptly charged at the Lord.

Then he jumped over him. The Lord spun around as Scalpel seemed to briefly defy his dense Blacktrinian nature as he perfectly planted his right foot on Beast Boy's left tusk, kicking off it and planting his left foot on Beast Boy's wide forehead, flipping off his teammate and bringing his left foot over and down onto the Lord's head, driving him face-first into the ground with a thundering crash. Scalpel immediately rose, snapping his foot free and moving away from the Lord's fallen form.

The tendrils caught him anyway, the Lord yanking the alien into the air as he surged back up, firing blasts with his other hand that Beast Boy transformed into a cat to escape. The Lord tossed Scalpel away once more, his blasting hand moving to strike the alien. Robin struck first, driving his new metal staff so deep into the Lord's increasingly-fragile form it almost hit the floor, the Titan leader yanking it out before the Lord could get a grip, brandishing the weapon in challenge.

"…_**MEANINGLESSSSSSSS!" **_The Lord rasped, manifesting six arms with swords that he drove towards Robin's body, the Titan retreating and fending off the slashes from all angles, their weapons a merged blur of black and gray. The Lord drove Robin backwards by stabbing his sword into the ground, the Titan juking backwards before they erupted beneath his feet. Starbolts drove the Lord back in turn, and the darkness god caught a flash of gold before Robin returned, planting his staff into the ground and leaping off it, his leg thrusting out and taking the Lord in the chest at the exact same time Gauntlet gave his leader 'a little push'. Said little push sent the Lord flying backwards…directly into Scalpel's eager claws, as he went with the momentum and spun-flipped the Lord over him, driving him directly into the ground like a piledriver, the impact cratering the ground. Having not shrugged off the recent solar blast, the Lord was unable to teleport or phase away, and Scalpel pounced on his prone form and began raining down clawed fist strikes, ripping at the Lord's arms and head.

Too close, too long. The Lord repaid Scalpel with a kick of his own, the alien flying up and ripping up part of the ceiling before he fell again. The Lord manifested back to his feet, trying to keep his 360 degree vision and other senses active; this had to stop. He couldn't keep dancing with the damn children as they weaved in and out and tried to cut him to pieces. Where was he in Etemenanki, slightly below mid-point?

Robin leapt in, staff spinning. The Lord formed a car-sized battle axe and tried to cleave the Titan leader in two.

Cyborg's hand beat him to it, the appendage launching off on a cable and pulling Robin out of his attack arc. The Lord ignored the efforts; he was at mid-point, he had to go-

Down.

Gauntlet promptly assisted by leaping in, spinning, and slashing down his foot in a Gauntlet energy-assisted axe-kick that crashed down on the Lord with an impact that put Scalpel's to shame, the force driving the Lord through the floor and a few more beyond it before impacting down on one too hard to break through, Gauntlet flipping away and manifesting another blade.

"You're dead." Gauntlet said, stabbing at the Lord. The Lord's whirling counter broke through Gauntlet's guard, lashing shadow tendrils knocking him backwards before the Lord blasted with both hands, the Titan going through a wall.

"Better and worse than you have _**TRIED**_, CHILD." The Lord said, and promptly directed another massive blast up through the hole in the ceiling he'd just made, his dark eyes darting around where he was. The arena-sized room was carved in a circle, its floor, walls, and the pillars around it battered and scorched. He was in the training room he'd used for Genocide. Which meant he had to go…

Beast Boy came out of nowhere, transforming from a fly to a chimpanzee. The Lord instinctively moved to block his strikes…and Beast Boy sank his teeth into the Lord's face instead, ripping out a chunk of shadow mass and recoiling away in both defence and repulsion, spitting out the black mess and clawing at his mouth. The Lord began reforming his face with Cyborg blasted another hole through the ceiling and blazed down, crimson sun blades flashing.

The Lord spun around the attack, elbowing Cyborg in the head. Beast Boy turned into a gorilla and launched his second attack; this one went considerably poorer as the Lord grabbed Cyborg by the head and thrust him forward into Beast Boy's punch. The changeling pulled the blow at the last second, but Cyborg's ear still rang with the impact, the Lord using him as a brace and kicking Beast Boy with both legs before spinning and hurling Cyborg through the air, kneeling down and punched the ground, black explosions bursting up and consuming both Titans. The sound of stone breaking violently reached the Lord's ears, and he stood back up.

Terra's attack shattered his whole upper body, the black stone pillar fired at him like a gigantic bullet. No sooner did the Lord reform than the pillar returned, now spinning like a fan. The Lord blew it apart, but Terra just threw another pillar at him. The Lord shattered that one with a punch; Terra recalled the pieces and fused them together, sharpening its end to a razor edge before she fired it at the Lord again.

This time, the Lord went towards the attack, leaping up and running across the pillar top before leaping at Terra. The girl's face filled with alarm, but her golden gaze did not falter, the pillar spinning around and firing itself directly at the Lord's back without any lost speed…

The Lord went from going towards Terra to straight down, his feet striking the ground with a crackling crunch. Terra tried a last-second adjustment, and ended up playing into the Lord's hands as he spun away from the pillar, avoiding it at the last moment as it raked his claws along its side. Terra stopped it before it impaled her, only to be caught as the energies blew the rock up, hurling Terra's smoking, bleeding form backwards. The Lord didn't even bother assessing how well he'd hit the woman; he was too busy assessing direction. If he went west…

Robin's spinning staff impacted on the Lord's arm, cracks shooting up the limb from the impact. The Lord snarled and slashed at Robin's face, doing his best to ignore the pain and the fact that such a simple thing was causing him pain. He'd use it. It wasn't easy to lead this child around by the nose, but it'd work as well as any man with the scent of blood in it.

"So desperate to rejoin your father?" The Lord said, manifesting yet another sword and swinging it at Robin. Robin's face remained stone, his staff blocking the Lord's strikes with expert grace even after all he'd gone through. "You should ask Collins, maybe he's actually HAPPY!"

The Lord reared up for a massive strike; Robin took the bait and dodged backwards. With a stomp of his foot, another eruption of energy knocked Robin skyward, the Lord dispelling his sword and lancing up after him, his clawed hand going straight for Robin's chest.

Starfire intercepted him, as expected.

Then she did an immediate U-Turn and tried to drag him back into the center of the room. That had NOT been expected. The Lord had planned for her to slam or blast him through another wall, so he could continue making his way down to the ley lines without explicitly looking like he was. Damn it, he couldn't look like he was struggling, but if he got dragged into the center of the room again, he'd have a harder time of it all around.

Force erupted off the Lord's body, knocking Starfire away, only for the Lord to crash and burn anyway, his body ripping into the floor as he landed. Damn it all, Raven's nullification curse in regards to his flight abilities STILL hadn't been fully purged. Why was it so insistent…maybe the twice-over nature of it?

Cyborg blasted another solar ray at him, and the Lord leapt to the side, only for Morgue to pepper his back with solar-plasma shots. The Lord whirled around, black energy blades flying, but Gauntlet picked that time to make his return and pounce on the Lord from above, raining down rapid-fire energy fists that drove the Lord into the floor. The Lord responded with barbed shadow tendrils, desperately trying to rip and seize onto the Gauntlet energies, but he could find no purchase, and Gauntlet promptly pulled himself up via an energy line attached to his back and pinned the Lord to the floor with a Gauntlet-blade, like an insect under glass. The smile on his face would have terrified his teammates.

The Lord merely paid him back in kind, a giant hand of shadow erupting from the ceiling and grabbing onto Gauntlet, his energy rope snapping as the hand smashed him through another pillar. Pulling himself back up, he grimaced as he forced himself back together, feeling the 'stress fractures' along his weakening form scream as he did so. Children…they were CHILDREN…even with the depths of their mutual grudge they were _**CHILDREN…**_

Scalpel's blade missed the Lord's head by inches, the alien rolling and springing back up to his feet. The Lord thrust out his clawed hand, and Scalpel's twin swords went into a blur as he deflected away the dark blades the Lord fired at him. Snorting, the Lord went into his own charge, leaping towards the alien only to be shoulder-rammed by Cyborg from his left flank. The Lord bounced once off the ground before he regained his bearings, flipping onto his feet, his tattered cloaks swirling around him, before Cyborg thrust out his arm and unleashed his gatling cannon on the Lord, the bullets ripping a mass of new holes through the Lord, and it hurt, he was down to being hurt by mere mortal weapons, this would not STAND-!

The Lord's barbed tendrils found better purchase in Cyborg, yanking the Titan towards him. Cyborg's gatling cannon immediately switched to his solar blade, faster than the Lord could pull the Titan to him.

Which was exactly what he wanted, as he immediately released Cyborg and exploded into a mass of shadow particles. Cyborg put on the brakes, his boot-jets roaring as he stopped in mid-air. He sensed by the chill running down what was left of his spine rather than by any machine scanners that the Lord had reformed behind him, and he turned around and slashed. Another tendril seized his wrist in mid-blow, blunting it before the Lord rammed himself into Cyborg, the two firing across the room and smashing through another wall.

The Titans gave pursuit. The island shook as the volcano continued to erupt, black clouds of ash mixing with the Lord's summoned black clouds.

* * *

Raven's restraints finally snapped, but all Raven could do was collapse onto the ground, every single bit of strength gone. She could feel the war going on beneath her, but all it did was increase her fear.

"No…my friends…you…you can't…"

* * *

Cyborg and the Lord crashed through a storeroom filled with spare electronics, leaving a mess of explosions and crackling electrical arcs in their wake before they smashed through another wall and found themselves in freefall, Cyborg's jets briefly disrupted from the process and the Lord still struggling with Raven's curse. The Lord saw the long, dark crystalline walls and cursed even more; he'd gone too far horizontally. The pair had ended up in one of the 'focussing paths' of the ley energies, where the magical forces would have been drawn up, first to open up the schism and afterwards merged with the Foreverwhere to accomplish the Lord's dreams and goals. At the bottom of the vertical shaft, clearly visible even with all the pathways build across it to traverse the length, seethed dark and light energies, a maelstrom of death for anything that touched it.

The Lord cursed inwardly. As much as he hated them, he knew the Titans weren't fools, especially their leader. The second that Robin followed him into this part of Etemenanki, he'd figure out what the Lord's plan was and move to stop him. That left one option; blitz to the bottom and try and break off at the last second, hiding himself and siphoning the power…

Then Cyborg punched him in the face, and the Lord furiously punched him back before he hurled him into the nearest wall and went directly into freefall…

The wire net whirled out, wrapping itself around the Lord's form to his utter shock. Mortal restraints? What good would THOSE do?

The answer was slow the Lord down three seconds so he could phase through it. His eyes caught the movement above before Starfire's burning fist slammed into his back, and the two went tumbling down the vein of Etemenanki.

"Your end calls." Starfire said, the Lord jerking his head to the side to avoid Starfire's burning eye beams. He immediately wrapped his cloak around her, ignoring the pain of her solar-charged body, and whiplashed to the side, bouncing them off a wall before he ricocheted and slammed both of them through one of the many criss-crossing bridges that stretched through the shaft to connect to various rooms. Starfire took the impact worse than the Lord, and the dark god tossed her dazed form aside and landed on another bridge, the alien falling past it as the Lord looked up.

Scalpel's stomping foot shook the expanse as the Lord dodged aside, and the two clashed blades until Gauntlet and Robin dropped down as well. With their last blow, the Lord slid around Scalpel and kicked him off the edge, and then transformed his blades into writhing, twisting tendrils, Robin and Gauntlet hammered at them with their weapons. The Lord blurred backwards after several strikes, planting his tendrils into the ground and sling-shotting himself back towards the pair, leaping and kicking Robin in the back so hard that he ended up tumbling off the side as well. The Lord stopped immediately after doing this and dove for the edge of the bridge himself, only for Gauntlet to plow into him, the two falling off together while the Titan struck and tore at him with multiple golden lines.

"Your impersonation is missing something!" The Lord said, and twisted around, the two smashing partially through another bridge. Despite his shields, Gauntlet was stunned like his companion from the impact, allowing the Lord to grab him by the face. "DEATH!"

Gauntlet's shields saved him again, barely, as the Lord faceplanted Gauntlet into the next stone expanse. Landing on his feet, the Lord looked down at the roiling ley energies beneath him. Very close…

So were his pursuers. Beast Boy leapt off one of the broken pieces of bridge above the Lord, transforming into a ten foot tall furry humanoid, the cryptoid known as the yeti, clawed hands attached to immensely strong arms shooting out to grab the Lord as he fell.

The Lord introduced his hand to Beast Boy first, blurring up and viciously uppercutting the shape shifter before hammering both fists down onto his giant back, sending him plummeting towards Gauntlet, the blonde Titan barely getting up a shield for the both of them before Beast Boy's impact smashed them through the bridge. The Lord floated there for a moment, assessing his direction…

Starfire's blazing punch missed, and as the Lord continued his dodge, he saw Robin falling down towards him, staff in hand.

This time, the Lord rose to meet him. Robin swung the staff, the blow missing as the Lord stopped at the last half-second, his hand shooting out and grabbing the metal bo, energy arcs surging out from the weapon and into the Titan's body. Starfire answered Robin's yell of pain, only for the energy to arc off the weapon and clamp onto Starfire, both crushing and shocking her. With a whir of jet engines, Cyborg returned, only to be grabbed as well, Scalpel and Beast Boy also being caught when they leapt to attack the Lord. The Lord smirked, and then barrelled forward at an angle, shoving Robin in front of him and dragging the Titans he had ensnared as the dark god smashed/pulled the Titans through the right wall of the vertical chasm and through the walls beyond.

The room they crashed into was unlike any other room in Etemenanki. Instead of black stone, metal, or dark crystal, the whole room was composed of bright diamond-like material, which looked partially constructed and partially grown. The Lord had created it himself, calling it paradisium, though despite its resemblance, it was not as strong as diamond, as the Lord smashed his targets through several protruding lengths of it before he crashed down to the floor, the Titans dropping around him. The room (and the others like it around the part of Etemenanki that connected directly to the ley lines) were essentially a safety value, the crystals within it made and aligned to help bleed off or focus energy as needed. At the moment, though, the Lord didn't care if the whole structure became flooded with raw destructive eldritch energies, as he yanked Robin's staff out of his briefly limp hands and transmuted it into black dust. As long as he managed to finish the damn Titans, EVERYTHING ELSE WAS SECONDARY.

Robin's fist flew into the Lord's hand, and he tossed Robin aside before he blurred over and grabbed Cyborg by the ankle.

"Welcome to the ninth level of hell!" The Lord snapped, swinging Cyborg around through a paradisium pillar. "Death is only the _**BEGINNING**_!"

Cyborg went flying through another crystal, white shards flying across the room as the Lord turned around, trying to hide his desperation. He was close…he just needed a good ten seconds, twenty at most…

The Titans clearly planned to give him none, as Starfire recovered from her 'trip' far faster than the Lord would have thought. Her blast was interrupted when the Lord fired into one of the paradisium crystals, the white shard refracting his blast into Starfire's side and blowing her away. With a snap of his fingers, the Lord teleported away from Gauntlet's pistoning energy fist, appearing on top of another paradisium shard above the Titan, his clawed hands blasting the Titan with arcing energy before he dropped down and kicked Gauntlet across the room, resuming his trek. Beast Boy's triceratops charge just hit more crystals as the Lord threw up a warp tunnel in front of him, and Morgue's bullet was caught, replicated, and thrown back at her fifty-fold as she scrambled for cover. The Lord sensed the geokinetic next and turned to smash whatever rock she decided to toss at him…

The mass of lava, tossed in a ball-like clump, hit him worse than any ton of bricks, the molten rock burning, crushing, and suffocating him all at once. Terra had needed surgeon-level care to draw the magma away from the volcanic eruption and into the room without roasting herself or her friends with the heat, but it had all been worth it as the Lord collapsed to one knee, his body actually catching on fire. He was too weak, he couldn't phase through it, it BURNED…

"What? You said we were in hell." Terra said.

The rock went from a dull crimson to solid black, the heat and fire on the Lord vanishing, the dark god standing back up as the rock cracked and shattered off his form. The fire lit up in his eyes, smoke exhaling from his mouth as his gaze settled on Terra.

"THEN TASTE PERDITION, AND CHOKE ON IT!" The Lord said, and exhaled forth the heat of the blood of the earth, like the dragons of old. Terra vanished in the fire; Beast Boy, Scalpel, Morgue, and even Cyborg were forced to try and take cover immediately afterwards as the Lord swept the fiery breath over the room, paradisium crystals shattering and igniting from the terrible heat. Spitting out the last dregs, the Lord turned and began to stagger back towards the access point that he sought…

Scalpel's thrown sword was deflected, but its purpose was served, Gauntlet leaping from the smoke and knocking the Lord upside the head, before he spun and backhand-uppercutted the Lord into the air, the Titan pressing forward like a man possessed, firing off punch after punch of yellow energy that caused the Lord to do a jerking air dance backwards before the Titan leapt, spun, and planted a foot that sent the Lord flying through another crystal. Staggering back to his feet, the Lord saw Gauntlet charge in, sweat and blood flying from his face as he slammed his armoured fist forward.

The Lord let him strike, the punch going directly through the Lord's body. He snarled, and then spat his last gout of flame into Gauntlet's face, the Titan recoiling back with a scream before the Lord backhanded him aside, Gauntlet crashing through several more paradisium shards before he vanished into the black smoke that had filled the room.

When the Lord turned around, Robin's fist literally cracked his jaw in half. Staggering back a step, the Lord's countering punch was blocked by Robin's crossed arms, the Starbolt taking him in the back a second later and driving him to one knee. The second one drove him forward onto the ground, and Robin brought up one foot, aiming to stomp the Lord's black skull into the dust.

Poor choice. The Lord's crushing fingers seized onto the metal boot as it descended, strength born of desperation hurling Robin back as the Lord got back up. Starfire's eye beams blew up half his face, but the Lord's seeking tendrils found an equal sore spot in Starfire's broken arm, seizing it and paralyzing the alien warrior with pain, just for a second, long enough to drag her to him and fire off two cruel blows to her face, the tendrils then raising her up to the ceiling headfirst and then smashing her down into the ground. Somehow, Robin found the strength not to yell out in fear and rage as he leapt at the Lord's back. The Lord heard him anyway, whipping his tendrils around and knocking the Titan backwards before his shadow filaments broke apart completely.

"Do you SEE, child?" The Lord rasped, his ravaged throat bubbling as he stomped on Starfire's head. "The prize of a hero? Your team, friends, family, forged in countless battles…do you see your ultimate reward of leading them into the abyss?"

The Lord whirled around, firing a gigantic spray of blasts behind him that reflected and detonated the paradisium crystals behind him as far as the eye could see, the Titans coming up from behind him lost in the flames, blades, and smoke. The Lord whirled around, blocking Robin's punch with crossed arms and throwing him backwards with a small burst of power, his body a ragged mess and his face a smoking ruin.

"When you get to the afterlife, when you find your father…do you think he will embrace you? Or turn you away for the futility of what you sacrificed, and why?" The Lord said.

"…this is the mission." Robin said, and charged.

The black light explosion was smaller, less potent…but when it faded the Lord stood behind Robin, one hand out. Robin stood still two seconds before the fresh wounds began to bleed, his body feeling like the Lord had struck every inch of it.

"This is the end." The Lord said, and walked on. The ley lines…

He heard Robin begin to fall.

The scraping sound he heard then made him turn around.

Robin's fist smashed into his face, driving the Lord back first into the wall of paradisium crystal he'd meant to filter the energy he so dearly needed through. The realization that the Titan had regained his feet instead of collapsing into a pool of his own blood hit him harder than the actual blow. HOW? That attack had felled RAVEN, how had the mortal CHILD resisted-?

Robin fired off another fist.

The Lord raised his hand to catch it again.

Robin's fist went through the Lord's, the blow smashing into his devastated face and smashing his head backwards into the crystal wall, cracks erupting from the white material from the impact. Somehow, even after all he'd endured, Tim Drake found the strength to unleash an assault of blows on the Lord that rang through the whole room, the cracks deepening.

The Lord's one remaining eye briefly caught Robin's exposed one. It was impossible. They were fools, wretches, the source of all his agonies. He was in the right. This world was his, it was owed to him-!

"It is." Robin said.

Then he punched the Lord so hard that he felt it vibrate all the way down to the soles of his feet, even as the punch smashed the Lord straight through the wall.

Crystal shards slashed into the Titan leader, but he did not recoil or yield, even as the Lord flew through the paradisium wall into the chasm beyond. Robin just watched.

It wasn't just a wall. It was both filter and blast shield, and beyond it lay nothing but empty air and the destroying energies of the ley lines. No hand holds. Nothing to catch onto.

And The Lord still…couldn't…shake…Raven's…curse. So there was nowhere to go but down.

He was falling again. Like a lifetime ago. Oblivion whispered in his ear.

The golden line around his ankle was stronger.

The Lord was yanked out his freefall, dragged back into the paradisium room like a hooked fish, his body sprawling on the ground before his enemies. He stared in surprise.

"What? You think we're just going to let you fall into a giant pool of unlimited power? HOW STUPID DO YOU THINK WE ARE?" Gauntlet said.

Then he smashed the Lord through the ceiling instead.

* * *

Raven could feel it. The vibrations through the palms of her hands, the shifting of the structure's magical energies pricking her ability to sense such things, developed long over time, and above all else, in her teammates' emotions, fierce triumph and righteous rage.

But she could feel IT too.

When the Lord smashed up through the floor, she forced herself to her feet. The Lord couldn't do the same, as he crawled forward from where he'd landed, his body a road map of devastation. His shadow form wept stinking ichor and mist, a foul miasma that echoed bodies trapped in tar and the festering rot of a poorly treated wound. He looked pathetic, beaten…

Yet…Raven knew. More than ever.

The Titans emerged from the hole the Lord had made, equally battered and worn, but still standing. Raven knew what they were going to do before they even did it, and reached out.

"Stop…"

Her voice was a reedy whisper, all that she'd endured robbing her even of that. Some of the Titans noticed her gesture, but others remained focussed on the Lord, as he continued to crawl slowly towards her. Cyborg locked on his cannon, keeping it aimed directly at the villain, Gauntlet and Starfire summoning their respective energies and Terra floating up several rocks nearby. Yet they did not attack, and Raven knew why.

The presentation. They felt she'd earned it. The Lord had hurt her so deeply, killed the man she'd loved, done his best to destroy her above all others. And now he was finished, and they wanted both him and her to know it, like a cat presenting a dead bird to its owner. It was the strange, twisted kindness of the closest of friends…

It was also the absolutely last and worst thing they could have done.

"Kill him…kill him-!" Raven choked out, but her voice had no volume, and she could not convey her heart…

But the Lord heard her.

He looked up at her, standing before him. Raven less looked into his eyes as she looked into the shattered puzzle beyond them. Beyond them, her friends stood triumphant…

And then it was too late.

The snap seemed as loud as a thunderclap to Raven, but it echoed only in her head.

For the Titans, they only knew something had gone horribly wrong when the Lord threw back his head and screamed so loud that all of them were deafened by it, Terra losing her hearing in one ear as the roar shattered the tiny bone within it. That was not the worst part.

The worst part was the final wave of darkness that spilled off the Lord. None of the Titans needed to be empaths to feel what was in that pulse. Rage. Unfathomable, inhuman RAGE, an anger fuelled by a hatred so dark and deep and black that not all the light in the universe could illuminate it. Had Raven not been so weak, her senses so worn down, something in her brain might have overloaded and blown out from attempting to process the magnitude of the rancor that had washed over her and her friends. As it was, she was merely paralyzed, her voice robbed from her.

The Titans staggered back, their eyes wide, every single one of them showing the same question. They didn't know what had just happened, especially after all this. But Raven did.

She had tried to prevent this. Tried to tell her friends what to do. The Lord's greatest weakness was self-defeatism, his inability to do things without forcing them through his prism of delusion and irrational self-righteousness. He couldn't just beat the Titans, or kill them; he had to _**WIN**_, to destroy their morality and reveal it as worthless and wrong, to punish them for the 'crime' of being 'heroes', to make them suffer until he'd wrung every drop of satisfaction he could from them. For these failings, he would constantly sabotage himself even when he took steps to prevent it. That, the Titans could beat. All the power in the universe did not good if the hand that held it didn't have a strong enough grip.

The Titans had subconscious desires too. The desire to avenge, the human desire to punish as well as destroy those who did them harm. It came through in all their deeds, nominally mere sparks, but the Lord had fanned their sparks for him into a flame. Even when they'd fought as hard as they could to stop him…they'd acted like him. They'd wanted to _**WIN**_, to crush the Lord like he so dearly wanted to crush them.

But they could not play the Lord's game forever. It was folly. They were not him. They had empathy, kindness, an actual sense of right and wrong.

And all of their angers combined couldn't hold a candle to the endless storm of raw _**FURY**_ that the Lord kept locked away inside him, filtering it through his flaws. In their actions, the Titans had won, their mistakes tiny in comparison to the Lord's…but they'd made them.

Now all of those flaws were gone. There was nothing left in the Lord that wanted to triumph and conquer. There was only the rage.

The rage…

And her father's power. Her power. He'd stolen it from her, but not the knowledge of how to use it. She felt all emotions; he fed off dark ones. In time, maybe he'd have figured out a use for them, but against her allies, with their weapons specifically designed to do him harm, he'd had no chance. Now they'd stripped away all of his own power in turn…

So he'd done likewise. He'd stripped away every single useful, varied, and subtle aspect of the Trigonpower and turned it into the daemon-magical equivalent of raw fuel. Fuel that'd he immediately dumped into his tank.

He'd have no control, not even for himself. But that kind of power, used that way, _NOW…_

Against _IT_…

Cyborg never knew what hit him. His advanced tracking mechanisms, programmed to give him microsecond reaction time, may as well have not been there. The Lord was just abruptly plunging his hands into Cyborg's chest, and as another deafening howl erupted from his mouth, the sound of rabid animals and suicide explosions, of blood spilling in mud and planes breaking themselves against the earth, the Lord ripped Cyborg literally in half, the Titan falling to pieces in a crackling hiss. He made no sound, but the scream in Raven's head, of surprise and shock and unbearable regret, not of his own injuries but how he had so suddenly and utterly failed his fellow Titans, nearly broke Raven's heart in half along with her friend.

It was over. All over. The Lord no longer wanted to win.

The Lord wanted to _**KILL**_.

_This is not World War II…this is Vietnam…_

The Titans were soldiers, heroes…and human. The split-second turnaround made them freeze up. It would have only lasted two seconds, but that was one second more than the Lord needed, as he turned and slashed out his arm. Energy arced across the floor in a sizzling crack, tearing past several of the Titans' feet before it struck Terra. The geokinetic didn't even have time look down, as the upward eruption of dark energies ripped right through her protective shield like paper, the power carving through her nervous system like a shark through bloody meat, before it finally reached her head and detonated in her brain, leaving her cerebrum a charred wreck. The energy washed away, and Terra hit the ground, blood leaking from her nose and blooming in the whites of her wide-staring eyes, every muscle in her body dead, the classic puppet with its strings cut.

Raven felt Terra scream inside, now a prisoner in her own head, denied even pain…and air, her lungs barely able to draw it in. Her body was as lifeless as mud.

Finally, the Titans reacted, full bore survival instinct kicking in. They made no sound, not even cries of pain and rage. They knew it would do nothing but waste time, as they scattered…

It was too late. There was no escape. Night was falling.

_We met as soul mates on Parris Island  
We left as inmates from an asylum  
And we were sharp, as sharp as knives  
And we were so gung ho to lay down our lives…_

Beast Boy was the bravest of all. In the space of five seconds, he'd lost his best friend and girlfriend. He'd always been considered the childish one, the immature green jokester. Yet when called upon in the worst way, he reacted in the best. He transformed into a lion and lunged at the Lord…

The arcs of energy ripped into his body, the Lord tearing into his mutated cells and their ability to shift and generate mass, slashing and burning every single centriole and mitochondrion he could. Beast Boy felt pain unlike anything he'd felt in his life, but he kept pushing forward, transforming into a bear and then a gorilla, his skin literally boiling as he tried to reach the Lord. He collapsed three feet from him, blood pooling around him as his body literally began to melt down, the pain being replaced by numb cold as his nervous system shut down.

The physical pain was nothing to Raven. It was the pain in Beast Boy's cooling mind, that he'd failed, failed when it mattered most…

_And it was dark, so dark at night  
And we held on to each other  
Like brother to brother  
We promised our mothers we'd write…_

The Lord manifested claws, but Starfire slammed into him, pulling him away…

The punch shattered six of Starfire's ribs, blood flying from the alien's mouth as she was knocked away. The Lord landed, as Morgue tried to get her gun up. The blurring backhanded blow shattered her nose and cheek, her cry of pain swallowed as the Lord manifested ripping, boring strands of wire-like power, the lengths piercing through Morgue's limbs and chest and drawing her back against the wall, blood spraying as she was simultaneously tied and impaled against the inner bones of Etemenanki, her cry turning into a tiny gurgle. Scalpel could not even bellow his own roar, as the Lord seemed to sense it and turn around, his arms lashing out and the ground erupting beneath the alien, multiple lengths of black crystal impaling through the alien from every angle, the last ones plunging through his throat and impaling through his left eye before bursting upward through his skull. Scalpel's blades clattered to the ground, his hat drifting down to join it as his blood formed a hissing puddle, the blackness of his remaining eye going midnight before it began to fade to gray. A failure in the end, even when he had something to fight for…

_We held the day in the palm of our hands  
They ruled the nights, and the nights  
Seemed to last as long as six weeks..._

Starfire had no more words or noise to give. Just every bit of her defiant, absolute fury, the emotion burning within her as red as any star. But compared to the Lord's, her rage was a candle, and when she hit him again he swiftly flipped and smashed her into the ground, raising his fist as he began to hammer it down into her face. Blood sprayed. Bones cracked.

Gauntlet knew, as he landed to strike, that what he was about to do was going to kill him. He didn't care. Just as long as it killed the Lord as well. His whole arm was glowing, not gold, but silver, as he reared back to fire off his final punch.

He felt the sharp pinch as the darkness blurred past him, like he'd been seized with the world's largest pair of tweezers.

Then his arm came off at the shoulder, the Gauntlet thudding uselessly onto the ground as blood erupted from his body as the Lord cut it off with one great scything blow from his clawed hand. Robert Candide barely felt it. All the strength went out of him as he fell to his knees, staring at his severed arm, feeling his life's blood flow out of him. It didn't make sense…this wasn't how it was supposed to go…they were the good guys, they won the day…

_Remember Charlie, remember Baker…  
They left their childhood on every acre…  
And who was wrong? And who was right?  
It didn't matter in the thick of the fights…_

Robin never froze. It didn't help. In seconds, his team was gone. The Lord had lost everything, and was proceeding to pull the Titans' whole world down with him as he fell. In that moment, Tim Drake knew what it must have been like to see the small speck falling down towards Hiroshima, to be sitting in a certain jet on a certain September date, to, to be on Pompeii when the ash and fire had come. Whatever emotion or thought you had was meaningless in the end, because the end was coming to eat you no matter how you were disposed. So he moved to fight.

The Lord moved to cut him down.

Starfire did as well. The Lord had pushed her beyond pain, and when she slammed into the Lord, Robin saw the green pulse light up beneath her skin. The alien had spent many a long night training with him, understanding how her body channeled and focused energy. He knew what that sight meant.

She was going to give the Lord everything she had, even if it meant she had to destroy her own body to unleash the necessary energies. Her last and final light…

Was not enough. The Lord seized her face, grabbing her and slamming her head into the ground. It did not kill her, but it stunned her, the Lord whirling around…

The blast from the Lord's eyes went through both of Robin's knees. Even before the pain, Raven felt the greater agony hit her leader, her friend, the agony of failure, after so much given to prevent it…

_Who's going to die?_

Everyone. Everything. They were just mortals, against the very incarnation of everything dark in their world.

Nothing.

They were nothing.

Everything died before it, in the end.

Even hope.

Raven's resolve shattered.

The red cage over the Foreverwhere cracked.

Robin saw what the Lord was doing, and even with two ruined knees he somehow moved. Moved to try and grab his love as the Lord hurled her through the air. Even in her benumbed state, Starfire tried to reach out for him…

Their fingers brushed.

Their eyes met. Robin had never seen despair there. _Not like this._

Starfire's body struck the red cage, and it shattered as the alien crashed through it and tumbled through the schism, vanishing into the perfect white. Robin turned even as he started to collapse, reaching out, as if his hand could call her back…

_And we would all go down together…  
We said we'd all go down together…  
Yes we would all go down together…_

The blade erupted from Robin's chest, blood spraying onto the floor. Robin didn't even get a chance to gasp before the Lord appeared before him, the second blade plunging directly through the Titan's heart.

In his eyes, the human race shone out to Robin.

The Lord twisted the blade as hard as he could.

Then he let go. Robin could only spare Raven one last sorrowful look, and then he collapsed on his side, not moving. A second later, Raven joined him, on her knees.

The Lord's final roar shook the whole island, the mad god shrieking a paroxysm of black hate and antipathy that seemed to echo across the world and time, the sound of every wronged soul whose pain had consumed every last part of them and left them with nothing but the dark, the dark that refused to comfort or avenge, the dark that simply WAS, was and always would be…

Then the Lord collapsed himself. His body began to break apart, absolutely everything expended, his use of the Trigonpower this way one final act of suicidal self-nullification. Raven could only watch, powerless, wounded the least and yet the most…

Then she felt it. Her heart could break no longer. Instead it just…stopped, not literally but figuratively, its ability to feel emotion seemingly burned to dead ash. Even after all that, even after all he'd taken…

There was no justice. Because there was one last spark in the Lord, one that absolutely refused to die.

It called the Foreverwhere to it. The white energy came, flowing out and to the Lord's vanishing form. Within seconds, he stabilized. After several more, the shadows began to return.

Silence filled the room for a time as this happened, and at first Raven could not process the sound the Lord made. It did not take long.

Laughter. Laughter that built from soft chuckles to semi-choking cachinnates, to full on roaring mirth, the Lord standing back up and going full-bore lunacy, his exultant mad joy echoing across the room as the Lord turned to look at Raven. She met his eyes and nothing more. She had nothing left.

"Olympus rises. The Titans fall. And Zeus sits on his throne." The Lord said, raising a hand. "Tell me, blackbird, do you understand now? When is one greater than ten?"

Raven had no answer.

"Ten…" The Lord said, raising both hands and spreading his fingers, counting off all the Titans, before lowering his left and curling his right hand into a fist. "One. **I. **_**WIN.**_"

Raven looked around at the ruined bodies of her friends. Perhaps the fact that she couldn't even cry was the cruellest thing the Lord had done yet.

"No, don't get up. You're fine there, blackbird. And as for the rest of you Titans…no. You don't get to die. Not yet. Not ever. What we have between us has gone too far for that." The Lord said, holding up a hand. A pallor of darkness spread anew across the room, washing over the fallen bodies of her teammates.

They were alive. On the very edge of death, but alive, all of them. The Lord glanced at Raven, and with one effort of will, he belatedly utilized her greatest power and took their pain. Raven had done this, so many times, to heal her friend's wounds. The Lord merely 'froze' them, the Titans locked into a cold stasis of sorts, neither truly alive or dead. With a gesture, the Lord summoned the black obsidian goblet that Raven had seen one cruel October day an eternity ago, dark strings of pulsing black liquid flowing from the Titans, even herself, and into the depths of the cup.

When Raven felt the sublime enjoyment of the Lord as he drank down her friends' mortal agonies, she nearly tore out her own throat to escape it all.

"No." The Lord said, pointing at Raven. Within a second, her hands were bound again. "Now then, Titans…I know you think I have no wisdom. Nothing new to say, no new way to say it, and what I say, you've heard so many times before. But you matched history against me. You see the result. Broken. And done." The Lord said, looking at Robin, only the glistening in his eyes showing any sign he was alive and alert. "This will be the last time we talk, Titans. I am going to make certain I _**SAVOR **_it."

A roil of darkness passed over the Lord's form, and he grimaced and held a hand up to his mouth as if to stifle a cough. The goo-like mess he spat out of his mouth was as red as blood and seethed with heat that matched Terra's lava. Raven recognized it; the remnants of her father's power.

"One final bit of bother…though if I'd been used so crudely, I'd be bothered as well." The Lord said, and snuffed the glob between his fingers, the mess transforming into red smoke that faded into nothingness. "You know…there's an irony here, Titans. In more than a few timelines I've glimpsed to give myself insight, you lot came together to fight Trigon to start. He was your first, your trial by fire…I suppose it's only fitting that here, he proves your undoing. Yes…in some ways, you gave birth to these warriors, Raven of Azarath. And now you've killed them, just as surely if you'd smothered them in their beds the very first night you all slept under one roof."

"Just get…it over with…kill us and be done…spare us your SHIT…" Raven managed to whisper, feeling blood run down her throat and between her lips from how raw her voice was.

"You claim my words as excrement, blackbird? You? Of this vanguard of heroes, their champion example of blood not defining nature?" The Lord said, walking over, unable to completely conceal his menacing rage under a veil of quiet victory. "How many times have you spoken after a battle, torn down the enemy's cause and beliefs, held yourself up as the speaker of truth, of the righteous sword and needed shield of the masses? Perhaps a better question; how many times have you had to repeat yourself doing THAT, because the enemies you decry do not convert or despair, but return with even more fire and venom in their hearts? You, your allies, claim me a parrot, and one with a limited range…how many times have you claim victory where there was none? How many times have you claimed change when there was none? How many times have _**YOU**_ claimed yourself the true and the right, when in truth if you understood anything about virtue and reality, you would not be standing here. Kneeling there. Laying there. Whichever. Don't you see, Titans? A brute like Slade, a fool like Sebastian, a never satisfied conqueror like your father, they'd have killed you already. Only I see what's truly needed. And that…is one last chance for you to understand."

Raven only gave a dull stare, unable to even show defiance.

"…Then again, maybe it's impossible. Maybe it's simply oil and water, unable to mix." The Lord said, turning back around and walking amongst the fallen Titans. "But I doubt that, Titans. We're simply too alike. We both want what's best for this world. We both desire to show our enemies no mercy. We both…came so close to victory. Perhaps there's less a line between us than a sight trick. A Rorschach test. One sees a butterfly, another sees a blood smear. The truth is less defined as definitive. The winner tells what is correct, the loser is seen to have deviated from it. Which is why I won, Titans. I'm the only one here who wants to define the world, instead of just letting it continue on in a long, slow downward grind into the ashcan of the universe. If only you understood that…"

The Lord paused near Cyborg.

"Perhaps it's more than an opposing viewpoint. What did your breed, those who worship technology, call it? A singularity, the concept of something that changes the world so much, that it becomes incomprehensible to those who came before? Like trying to explain a missile to a Spartan, or non-Neutonian liquids to Sitting Bull? Is that what we are, in the end? Two opposing singularities, each vying to overthrow the other? The inverse of magnetism, forever opposing instead of attracting? I ponder these things, Titans, even now, because if tomorrow belongs to me, it does me no good if tomorrow crashes and burns down around my ears. I will accept many things, but validation of your cause from beyond the grave? No. It will not happen. You will NOT be born posthumously."

The Lord paused a moment, and then strolled back over to Raven.

"Maybe that's it. Maybe it's simply a matter of taking what has been said before you, and instead of understanding it, trying to use it to make others understand it as you see fit. Like Nietzsche." The Lord said. "I've been reading his works a great deal recently, Raven. Oh, I'm sure you think you know why. That his mindset appeals to me, the idea of abandoning all morals and restraint because nothing matters…do not insult yourself by thinking me like his sister, Raven, rewriting his works to suit my thoughts. You should know I, and Nietzsche, are far more complicated than that."

"He was mad too…"

"By syphilis. A weakness of the flesh. I'm not interested in that, Raven. I give more sway to his concept that there is no equality, and to think otherwise is as corruptive as you think I am. It doesn't matter how much you pat yourself on the back for protecting the human race with your powers, Titan, Titans. YOU ARE NOT EQUAL. This has nothing to do with what so many small-brained black sheep like to bleat, that you should rule people and take whatever you want because you have power, or whether they deserve to be protected or not. You are not equal to them, and the refusal to recognize that…well, it's as he said. The will to power. Yes, that is a highly suspect work, but you can still see Nietzsche's blood in it. Considering he was not above revising his opinion and his works, it holds equal credence. I suspect that even the man himself did not wholly know what he wrote. But I do."

Raven said nothing. The Lord took a moment to further 'treat' the Titans' wounds, and then resumed speaking.

"Nietzsche spoke of something else. The eternal recurrence. Forever returning to the same. In his will to power, he talked about that in the end, humans are constructed out their desire to survive and thrive, their desire to have POWER. This lies at the heart of every flaw of humanity and in how every great human chance has been squandered throughout history. Eternal recurrence. Man forever falling prey to his flaws, the same ones, the same reasons, over and over again. In these days of beings that can shatter worlds…it cannot be allowed to endure any more. The heroes, the ones that claim equality for all, they must be cast aside. The true superman must return."

"Do you…really think…"

"No, Raven. I _succeed._ Nietzsche wrote of these things, but he offered no answers. He was a nihilist; he put forth all these examinations but did nothing with them because he believed there was no point. I shall surpass his failed despair, just as I have surpassed the flesh and the moral chains you tried to hold me with. He wrote that God was false, a lie put forth to destroy the superman…I have proven _that_ false. I ascend past his mental limitations. I am both God AND Superman, WITHOUT equal. I will do what no one before or after Nietzsche could do. I will bring peace and acceptance to humanity, whatever it takes. I WILL break the cycle. I will take life back from the misery you'd condemn it to."

"…every…single…VILLAIN-!" Raven literally spat blood saying the third word. "Has…believed the same! You are…no different!"

"And once again, you heroes show how little you understand me. I don't blame you. All those who came before barely understood you, if at all." The Lord said, holding up a hand and crafting dark shadows of the people he spoke of. "The Anti-Monitor's gaze was too vast, too concerned with consuming existence to worry about its insects, until they stung him to death. Darkseid went too far; when your very essence is dragging the universe into oblivion, you have failed as anything save a target. Alexander and Prime couldn't see past their own judgments on the world. Sinestro couldn't see past his ego. Necron couldn't see past his concept of blasphemy. Luthor, Ghul, Sivana, Adam, Eclipso, Kobra, Neron, Starro, Savage, Libra…none of them understood your lot. Not like I do. Didn't you see it? How much we resembled the other in this last, final battle? What made all the difference is that I understood you greater. Because, my dear Raven, I'm not the one who thinks she gleaned such vital information from my head when she should have realized anything I wanted the blackbird to know, _**I DAMN WELL LET HER KNOW**_."

Raven found she could feel again, as her heart of stone shuddered and cracked, before turning to ash. In the end, all it produced was two last tears, running down her face, the Titan unable to even wipe them away.

"Yes Raven. This was a trap. It was _always _a trap. I let you know about my plans to draw you in. You almost, ALMOST made it work for you anyway…but…well…isn't that just your story?" The Lord said, turning back around. "This was your plan because on the basis that if I _didn't _know, then the more people you told increased the chances of me finding out. You came so close with just these, imagine if you'd brought just one more, let alone your army? You'd have crushed me into dust, but you threw it away. Because you knew that if I found out, I'd make you pay for what you cost me. You were right. You should have done it anyway, Titans. This is not a game. THIS IS WAR. _**YOU **_made it war. In war, you do everything you can to destroy the enemy, and you pay the price of making that enemy, _**OR YOU LOSE.**_ You did this to protect friends, family, loved ones…now you've lost, and lost them in turn. You should have paid the price, Titans. In risk, and in blood and agony if needed. But you refused to. You showed, once and for all, why you are not only children, but CHILDISH."

The Lord drank the last of his goblet and tossed it away, the cup burning to nothing before it hit the ground.

"You try so hard to change that fact, don't you? This war, this burden, you try and define it as a game. A child's game. Oh don't claim otherwise, your broken bodies speak louder than you ever can! You wrap childishness around you like the security blanket it is! Its appeal to simple lies blinds you, calls you, LOOK WHO IT'S DRAWN IN! Geniuses, hardened warriors, people who can change the face of the world…all drawn to the game! All trying to escape the adult world, where the hard decisions are made. The acts of 'heartlessness' and 'atrocity', of culling and selection, all the sacrifices needed, now, more than ever before. That's where I dwell, Titans. You sit on your playground and call it darkness and bad. In the end, that only reflects on you. Heroism itself is childish, a game of immature minds. Age, experience, history, it means nothing. In the end, you all just want to play. ALL YOU HEROES. You don't want to grow up. You're out in the backyard, ignoring the dark, ignoring your parents calling for you, in the vain hopes that somehow, this means you'll get to play a little more, and that 'a little more' will never end."

The Lord stopped, his hand clenching.

"There is no playing in the adult world, the real world. No happiness. No joy. There is hard work, there is sacrifice, and there is pain. If I was wrong, I'd be broken. I AM NOT WRONG." The Lord hissed. "In the end, you either grow up…or you lose what allows you to be childish. You should have come to war, Titans. The _game _is done."

Turning around, the Lord strolled back to the Foreverwhere.

"For ALL of you. Your light is done. MY light will cast you out. I shall grant my clones this sacred fire, and they will burn the heroes of this world and reveal the lies of their nature. A man will fall in Metropolis. A legacy will end in Gotham. An Amazon will have no world, the run will end for the speed, the light will eat the green, ring and plant both. There will be no war for them, Titans. Just a figure, and then doom. To them, and all their ilk. In this light, I will strike down the vengeance of God himself. It will be easy. _**I AM GOD NOW.**_"

For a few moments, the Lord went quiet again.

"And yet…what a waste. As much as I hate it…I do not ignore what your dogma has wrought. Look what heroism made of you. Such insignificant beings…who nearly brought down God Himself. Such talent, such drive, such…light. The very crux of what I want to preserve and grow in this world. The pinnacle of human, of living potential…all wasted on heroism. Human, all too human…the wanderers and their shadow. So no, Titans, I will not kill you. You do not deserve death. In every…_single_…_**aspect**_…_**of such a claim.**_"

The Lord turned back around. His face seemed ready to crack in half, as it seem to be trying to express sadistic glee and joyful news at the same time.

"I have learned much, from my work on your fallen companion. On Miss Mori. You will not be killed. You will be remade. Your potential will be put to proper use. You will be like every other failed culture of this world. Torn down and devoured whole, and cast in the image of your superior. In THAT, you will see the folly of your choices. You will see just how little this world deserved them. And you will see a better world, because you will help me make it. The weak and the botched shall perish: first principle of our charity. And one should help them to it."

The Lord walked back into the center of the Titans, looking one last time at Raven.

"…do you really hate us that much?" Raven somehow whispered.

"I hate you more than you could even begin to comprehend." The Lord said, his tone simple, like he was discussing the concept of gravity.

"…God damn you."

"I think he already has."

The Lord raised one hand.

"But…after all…what does not kill you…makes you…stronger."

The Lord began to call on the Foreverwhere, the light that could grant the spark to universes…

It was not Raven who stopped him. None of the Titans could. Instead, he paused on his own, before glancing to the side.

"Oh yes…in all the excitement, I almost forgot." The Lord said, as the Abhorred slinked out of the shadows. "Hmmm. An oversight by God, stopped by his creations. Truly I am good."

The Abhorred reached out, the necklace dangling from its hand. Raven recognized it, but that recognition brought nothing to her. She'd crossed the point of no return. Simple silver, the necklace had two charms on it. One was a Celtic knot, and the other a small racoon. Ryce's necklace.

"You understand then, Raven. I have covered all my bases." The Lord said, before looking at the Abhorred. "The paradisium frameworks in the base of the structure have been badly damaged, go repair them before the ley lines flood the whole island with disintegrative energy."

The Abhorred nodded and sank into the floor, disappearing.

"Where was I? Ah, yes…I have not forgotten your maid in all this: she too has been taken care of. You recall my dealings with her, do you not? I haven't forgotten. Oh don't worry, I didn't kill her. That doesn't matter. Your Tower has been turned into her prison. Every way she could communicate has been cut. She can't get out, and she can't call for help. It's over. There is no cavalry coming, Titans. The story is done, including her part in it. So perhaps you're wondering, why take a trophy? Well…that's the part of the story even you don't know. The Dead Sea Scrolls to your Bible. Metestasnathean."

"…Adam?" Raven said.

"Oh, you remember his name? Ironic, considering what all of you forgot. Then again…maybe you shouldn't blame yourself. Do you remember Triumph? The Inferior Five? Desdemona Lament? No? Such is the fate of those who find themselves on the wrong side of a malleable universe, like Matthews did. That's why, to you, he's just some strange creature from another realm with strange pockets of knowledge. But I…I remember him far better. I _know_ him far better. I know what he's capable of. You don't, and I assure you what you don't know is a lot. It's not happening this time. You see this?" The Lord said, pointing to the racoon. "A gift. From a lost little boy to a lost little girl. Trying to pin down that infernal bane of my existence is a task and a half, based on how uncertain his position is. You've seen that, haven't you Raven? A random magical hat made him literally disappear, and he never came back, even to help you go to your doom. So, with this? I'm going to _call _him back."

Raven, despite herself, cocked her head slightly.

"You're confused? You're wondering where this came from? Oh, the stories I could tell…perhaps you'll learn it in the future. When it belongs to me." The Lord said. "Rest assured, I have very good reasons for wanting him here and dealt with. If anything can match the antipathy I have for you Titans, Metestasnathean is it. Morning Child. Little boy lost. The last loose end to tie up before I properly claim my destiny-"

Then the Lord cocked his head, before looking down at the necklace.

"…heh." The Lord said. "Did you hear me?"

* * *

This is how the world ends.

There had been too many whimpers and bangs today to finish that with any accuracy.

Alaryce sat prone as if restrained. She didn't bother wondering about what came next. Eyes shut, forehead resting against the cool metal seal, she really could not have given less of a damn. This is how the world ends.

With a spark?

Tension skittered over the defeated slope of her back. The listless glaze over her watching eye began to lift, and Alaryce understood how right she was. This IS how the world ends. Her shoulders were first, with trembling that ran through them, spreading over her chest, curling into her gut. Her mouth followed, dropping open to permit the sounds on her lips to hiccup forth.

Ryce was giggling.

"Heheheheh ye-heehehe...Y-Ye…sss…Of course."

It bubbled out of her, uncontrollable. Pushed out of her, like frothing soda from a jostled bottle. The absurdity of it all pulled her into a full on belly laugh. Somewhere along her despair, she had waltzed into a living Dali painting. It was only with all her effort that she managed to roll her body so that her back pressed up against the door.

When she finally opened her eyes, they met her father's and she smiled at him.

"You… perfect asshole."

* * *

The necklace sank into the Lord's hand as he turned around, looking at nothing in particular. When he spoke, he seemed to be talking to the air.

"Did you think something will change if you come to me instead of being dragged? Do you think the chaos that flows in you will somehow protect you better that way? You forget yourself, Matthews. There's a difference between the edge of my gaze and its center. Or do you know what I've done and want to make your own last stand?"

Raven couldn't sense it, but she knew. Metatron was finally coming back. If she could still feel shame, she might have felt it based on the fact she couldn't muster up the effort to try and warn him he was walking into the lion's den…

_Chaos._

_You cannot control chaos, but in time, you can grow used to it. Learn the best way to go with the flow._

_Know the best time to disappear…_

"You should have stayed with the group. THEN, you could have been the tipping factor. Perhaps how you were ripped from their lives was a sign? Perhaps you doomed them as much as the blackbird? I wonder…will you have sanity in the end? Or will madness be your only comfort as it always was?"

_What was it you said? About edges of vision? Loose ends?_

"You're just like the rest of them." The Lord said, raising his hands, his arms crackling with power. "A child. The last child, unwilling to grow up. Come on then, Peter Pan. Neverland falls. Clap your hands as much as you want. Bring whatever you consider a miracle."

_It'd been hot and dusty and he hadn't been able to catch his feet. The sky had been swallowed up by darkness._

For a moment, there was nothing.

For another, it seemed like something was scurrying on the edge of her vision.

Then the white line slapped the Lord across the face.

_How nice of someone to catch him before the world went tumbling away again. Better than the world ceasing to exist._

The Lord could only stare, before raising a hand to his face and the glowing yellow micro-orbs that had been shoved into his body.

"Impossible."

The solar explosion blew the Lord's head apart, his body staggering back and collapsing onto the ground.

"You said it." Noel Collins said. "NOT me."

* * *

"…_what the FUCK just happened?" Noel Collins cursed. He'd seen the end coming, then something had crashed into him, then he'd felt nothing, and suddenly he was in a pine forest somewhere sitting on old needles and one pine cone in a very unpleasant place._

"_Oh…Noel. Not what I expected. Hi." Metatron said, crouching in one of the tree's nearby branches. He took in their surroundings. "There's a lot of sap here."_

"_Adam?…the fuck happened where are we where did you THE HELL?"_

"_Well, as I understand it, I finally got back to our world, but as it turned out Ricky was Hiroshima'ing my arrival point with enough magic that I Jumped pretty much immediately – with you, as it turns out. You should never tackle me: I have bad experiences with tackles and tall men in suits. And so do you, now. This probably means that attack wasn't meant for me, doesn't it? Oh, and, some place where no one could make a good burger, and see above." Metatron said, ticking off his fingers._

"…_Take us back to the fight! NOW!"_

"_I can't."_

"_What do you MEAN YOU CAN'T?"_

"_I can't control the Jumps. They just happen. Some things make them happen faster or more."_

"_Then we go find one of those things and do it!"_

"_Won't help. I go where I go. At best I have some idea of where I'm going. I can't tell when or stop it. To my credit, I've yet to land in an oxygen-free environment for the third time."_

"…_then…" Savior said, despair creeping into his tone._

"_We'll get back eventually."_

"…_Adam. Your Jumps. How well does time match up with them?"_

"_Hm?"_

"_If you jump out of our world, spend four months away, and then come back, has four months passed in our world too?"_

"_Ah. Never really paid attention to that, it's pretty different no matter where you are."_

_Noel, in a gentle but fierce way, yanked Adam Matthews out of his tree._

"_Either figure it out, or figure out how to get us back there right now."_

"_And if things don't work that way?"_

"…_you take me with you. Wherever you go. Because I am going to make damn sure that no matter what, that bastard's time RUNS OUT."_

* * *

…Hope.

The Lord had been wrong. Miracles were heroes' stock in trade.

"So!" Metatron clapped his hands, drawing attention to his own smiling presence. "Quick recap, aye? I'm taken AWAY from the group, like you said, and yet the 'tipping factor' I could have been quickly becomes irrelevant when the kids beat your toy soldiers without me anyway. And then when I finally DO show up, it's to find you trying to erase my brightlite friend over here." He said, leaning on Noel's shoulder. "Only to leave immediately and take him with me. And then we spent _twenty-two months _having our combined penchant for attracting trouble land us with a proverbial stockpile of solar weaponry."

"Among other things." Noel said, as he drew what appeared to be a broken hilt out from beneath his tattered coat, even as the Lord began to reform before him.

"_**COLLINS!"**_

"They called this blade the Auspicious Blight. It was forged of the blood of six children born between a god and a mortal man. The liege-emperor whose son I assisted in battle granted me one swing of it in return." Noel said, and promptly swung the hilt at the Lord. For half a second, a blade of interlocked red and green metals appeared at the end of the hilt, and the sound like a thousand weapons crashing against each other echoed across the room before the Lord shrieked and exploded into pieces, all of them scattering across the room like lumps of dead flesh.

"Swing well spent." Noel said, and tossed the hilt aside as it began to disintegrate.

"You _know_ that didn't kill him." Metatron pointed out.

"And yet I have never been a more satisfied customer." Noel said, pulling out a small mechanical device and placing it to his eye as he looked around. The fierce satisfaction he'd felt was immediately swallowed by panic as he not only realized the state of his fellow Titans, but also the fact that by violently disassembling the Lord, the stasis he'd placed the Titans in had broken as well, and their fatal injuries had resumed doing their best to be fatal. "SHIT!"

"Can you take a minute to have your mind boggled at the sheer ODDS are on all the events preceding our arrival lining up like they did?" Metatron said, smiling while he looked around at the scattered remains of the Lord. "What are those signs telling you now?"

"ADAM! STOP TAUNTING HIM, THEY'RE DYING!" Savior said, as he ran over and knelt by Raven. "Raven? Can you see me? Do you hear me?"

"…Noel…" Raven said. She could feel again. She could cry again, fresh tears tracing down her face. "You're alive…you're alive…"

"Thanks to Adam. Maybe I'm not as damned as I thought I was." Noel said, giving Raven a quick smile as the Shimmer sawed through her restraints. The Titan had replaced his lost black leather jacket with a long brown patched coat, another Shimmer strand producing a black vial from within it. "But no time. The Titans are dying. You're our only hope…"

"I have no strength left…"

"Amrit. Literal nectar of a pantheon of living gods. Heavily diluted with water. I was going to drink it myself, but…" Noel said. "This will help you Raven. Drink it down."

Raven partially drank and partially had the vial poured down her throat. The liquid lit her throat on fire, but the pain vanished as she felt a slight pressure in her nose and ears. The Shimmer. Noel grimaced before gritting his teeth, trying not to curl into a foetal position as the divine tincture coursed into Raven's body, the white-haired Titan taking the pain so Raven could maximize her healing.

With it, Raven felt strength return to her. It did not cast off all of her wounds and exertions, but she felt the void within her snap shut, the possibilities arising in her heart and soul once more.

"Adam! Cyborg!" Savior said, reaching into his coat again and tossing Metatron a small metal box, the half-demon nodding as he ran over to the shattered Titan. "ALWAYS be prepared. That takes cares of what you can't handle. Raven…save them. I'll take the pain."

"You could-"

"I REFUSE TO DIE. DO IT."

Raven held out her hands, drawing in her focus. She'd taught herself these ways her whole life, and she needed them now more than ever.

"…azarath metrion zinthos…"

The dark energies bloomed around the Titans, the shock or cold that had come on them from the Lord's own shattering fading. Metatron pulled open the box, revealing a small glowing power cell and several strips of reinforced titanium steel, as well as a swarm of white flashing nanomachines that seized the metal and battery and drew it down to Cyborg's form as Raven called it together. The same power pulled the spikes from Scalpel's body and the wires from Morgue's, and drew Gauntlet's severed arm back to where it had been cut…

Then she began.

The pain was worse than anything Savior had ever felt any time the Shimmer had been cut, so great he couldn't even scream; if he hadn't slipped in a mouth guard before Raven had begun, he probably would have broken both his jaw and his teeth from grinding them so hard. He warred against passing out, the gulf of unconsciousness looming up, fading briefly, and then dragging him to the very edge before it began to recede. Around him, the Titans were pulled back from their own brinks, their bodies knitting back together as best Raven could manage, Cyborg's aided by the speciality kit Savior had packed away.

Hope. They spoke no words, but Raven could feel it in them. The abyss had gazed into them…and the world had let them turn their gaze aside.

Even so, Raven could only do so much, and despite her deepest wants, she broke the connection, her lungs gasping for air as she hunched over, drawing in deep ragged breaths.

"Saved them…but so much damage…I…I don't know…"

"The Shadow knows." Metatron said. Savior looked around at the Titans. They were alive, but none of them were yet in a state where they could jump back up and continue fighting. If Raven could do more healing, she would need time.

And the darkness was coming back.

"_That_ shadow, to be precise. Though Jung's arguably could too."

"…finish the job, Raven. We'll take care of this for now." Savior said, standing back up.

"Noel…please…"

"I know." Noel said, looking back at Raven, his face quietly determined. "We're all going to end this, and no one dies. Not today."

"And how does that fact 151,600 people die every day measure against that bold statement of heroism?" Metatron asked. Savior's only answer was a brief look of exasperation, before his eyes turned back to the threat at hand.

Shimmer strands bloomed out Noel's coat as he extracted more items from them, before discarding the patchwork garment. His black jeans had been replaced by grey and blue pants that looked partially plastic and partially metallic, and his T-shirt was covered with a metallic chest plate that lit up in cascading waves of light. Savior produced a foot and a half long mace-like weapon, four small axe-like blades extracting from its head even as Savior produced a black and silver firearm that extracted small mechanical tendrils that linked up to the Shimmer, a few other weapons settling onto his belt as he stepped forward.

"_**Collins…" **_The Lord said, the pieces having slowly drawn back together.

"Twenty-two months, after Adam pulled me away from your doom. Twenty-two months of not knowing what happened to my friends. Twenty-two months of nightmares and regrets. A hundred different worlds, waiting for things to finally go right, for Adam to bring us back…twenty-two months, Richard. A hundred worlds. I made damn sure I took everything I could from each one. So you'd know damn well every regret I had, and more." Savior said.

"You…should have stayed on one of them. Let me believe you were dead. You might have escaped your fate…_mortal_." The shadowy mass said, emphasizing the last word as it began to rise up. Reminding Noel of how close he'd come.

In response, the Shimmer pulled something on Noel's gun that caused the barrel and handle to light up with a crimson glow, even as another Shimmer strand extracting a glowing golden rod and inserted it into the hilt of Savior's melee weapon, the same gold lighting up in an aura around the blades and bludgeon, like a tiny sun.

"I know my fate. One day my name will be associated with the memory of something tremendous…a crisis without equal on earth, the most profound collision of conscience, a decision that was conjured up against everything that had been believed, demanded, hallowed so far." Savior said. The Lord made an odd sound, partly a chuckle, partly a snarl. Savior just snarled right back.

"I am no man. I AM _DYNAMITE_."

With that, he charged.

* * *

The outside of Etemenanki exploded outwards so violently the whole tower shook. The flailing form that flew out tried to regain its balance before it finally hit the cliff below and crashed through it, the rock crumbling down around the form as it went limp among the devastation.

"Word of advice." The Lord said, black smoke rising from his hand. "Sometimes a _word_ is better."


	9. Always

Chapter 9: Always

"_The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are so certain of themselves, and wiser people so full of doubts."_

-Bertrand Russel

"_Now hatred is by far the longest pleasure_

_men love in haste but they detest at leisure."_

-Lord Byron, Don Juan Canto XIII (1823)

_**The bard wrote 'All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players'…and in his plays where lies underwrote people's existence, the fool always tended to be the only one who spoke the truth. I suppose it's fitting even the greatest of humans couldn't properly understand the fools of the world…**_

_**I thought Metestasnathean had potential once. Proper clay. Instead he turned out to be little more than mud. Mud has little use besides building bricks, and you can only do so much with a brick.**_

_He will go on to say that I don't understand. It always comes to that._

_But if I didn't, he never understood just as badly. Not on the physical – me, a Fae, really? That's cute – not on the spiritual. His shortcomings were in my mirror, and it lead to my wiping their smudges clean._

_**Some might ask, why devote so much effort to him? Why is he worth it? Ah, but you see…therein lies the rub. Better to have a grudge be inexplicable and confusing than perfectly understandable. It's when your enemies understand your enmities that problems arise.**_

_**If you must have a reason…I have little tolerance of fools.**_

_**A fool never knows when to stop.**_

_**A fool never bothers to grasp his own pointlessness.**_

_**A fool does not understand what he sees. He looks upon the most important, most pressing things, the things so bright and harsh that even the likes of myself cannot bear to look on them any more, and he DOES NOT UNDERSTAND.**_

_**It is not a fair trade. I have his true name, and little else. He has the truth, and yet he persists in being a thorn in my side. He. Persists. ON BEING.**_

_**If he will not understand, if he insists on being a brick instead of being clay…then I will make him like his allies. The ones who forgot him. His existence so unimportant that the universe did nothing to try and correct that change. I will unmake them, and him. And any who stand in my way who do not understand.**_

_I don't understand him? I was there the first time he made that vow. I know its tired weight, and I know its feeble, overused, state._

_Four-hundred and sixty-three. That is the number of your conviction._

_**IT MATTERS NOT. NOT TODAY. TODAY IT ENDS. FOR INDEED THE HAND OF THE LORD WAS AGAINST THEM. TO DESTROY THEM FROM AMONG THE HOST. **_

_**UNTIL THEY WERE CONSUMED.**_

* * *

No…not again…

Her boyfriend, thought lost and then granted the grace so many heroes had been shown, was not dead. Yet all his vows, his preparations…useless in the face of the Foreverwhere. The Lord knew him, had utilized his flaws before…and once again, not only reforming and recharging, gambling that Savior wouldn't 'lower' himself to chasing around masses of cancerous shadow when he wanted a face he could pound in. He hadn't, and he hadn't gotten the chance, the Lord nearly knocking him clear out of his boots and halfway across the island.

"Well then. That was…aggravatingly pointless. But that's pretty much your hat, isn't it Titans?" The Lord said, turning back around to face Raven. When he didn't see a certain target, his eyes narrowed, and half a moment later Metatron dropped down by the hole the Lord had made, peering out onto the devastated landscape of _La Voix_. "Oh yes. YOU."

"Let's be fair to the man, he was still shaken seeing an alternative version of himself make out with his mother." Metatron said. The Lord gave a brief smirk, both amused and not, and turned back to properly face the man, gesturing towards the black and gold haired Titan.

"Metesta-"

Metatron cocked his head, and the Lord's hand exploded, golden steam shooting into the air from where the appendage had been. The Lord's eyes flicked to the sight.

"That was interesting." The Lord said.

"I'd say more inconvenient." Metatron replied, his calm eyes roaming across the Lord's body. Everywhere his gaze fell, a similar contained explosion followed, golden steam ripping up through the Lord's body like a storm of miniature geysers. A normal man would have reduced to cooked hamburger. The Lord barely staggered back a step.

"So when did you start resorting to instant murder as a tactic?" The Lord said, his wounds closing up, more darkness replacing his destroyed hand.

"AM I murdering you? That's surprising. Let's call that an unexpected side effect. This is more of a full body cavity search for you, really. Now you get to experience the full delight without the need of an airport-"

Metatron leapt away, the Lord's claws scything through the wall behind where he'd been standing. With a blast of golden heat, Metatron shoved himself back down to the floor half a second before the Lord's clawed hand sliced through the air where he'd been. After another second, Metatron was halfway across the room, the Lord slashing the floor with such intensity a fifteen-foot long groove was carved into the black rock. Metatron almost casually completing his dodging flips, proceeded to stop upside down, balancing himself on one arm.

"Faster than I remember." The Lord said, and raised up his clawed hand, a spray of crackling black orbs flying towards Metatron. With another cock of the lost Titan's head, they exploded, more golden steam escaping them. "Better hand to eye coordination, too. I guess Collins couldn't abide you just sitting around and sampling the local cuisines, could he?"

"He didn't ask me to do much of anything." Metatron said, flipping back onto his feet in one smooth 180-degree motion before settling into a crouch. "But he can be very inspirational when he wants to be, you know? You do. Probably why he was the one you messed with."

"No, actually, that was because you proved to be absolutely worthless at it. Well, that, and he was weak. Like all of them, I just exploited him first. Like you."

"Now work in a crack about my sister's fate, take a stab at my untimely death. Ssss. Stick a knife in there." Metatron said, grinning with amusement. "Touched a nerve? That was just a shade more juvenile than usual."

"No, Morning Child, THIS is what happens when you touch a nerve." The Lord said, and held out a hand.

Sophie's body flew into his hand a few seconds later, the mortician's eyes wide with alarm.

"No bats, mortal. And no heroics from you, alien. If you can even stand up." The Lord said, directing the second sentence at Scalpel while holding Morgue up in front of him. With a slight twirl, the necklace the Lord had stolen extracted from his free hand, dangling from the black fingers. "This is what you were 'searching' for, halfbreed? Well, try and take it. But I assure you, you will not like the cost."

Metatron considered things for a second, taking in the scene. The Lord stared back, ignoring the mortician's mild struggles and Scalpel's failed attempts to stand.

"Okay, Ricky. I'll play. What's the cost?"

"Oh, she'll die. Or you will. Or both of you will wish you were dead." The Lord said. "See, Adam, when it comes to you…there is nothing off the table."

Metatron paused a few more seconds.

Then he did something unexpected. He scoffed.

"You're not going to kill her."

Then he charged headlong at the Lord like a bullet.

The Lord's only reply was to thrust Sophie towards her fellow Titan. Metatron held out one hand, a brief gout of golden steam erupting from it.

Before thrusting out his other hand, grabbing onto Sophie's shoulders, and leapfrogging over her and the Lord.

Or rather, her and the Lord's arm. Metatron found the rest of the Lord intercepting him with a thunderous kick, and as Metatron bounced off the ground, the Lord landed, his floating arm tossing Sophie aside before re-attaching itself to the Lord's body.

"Funny how little that availed you. Because you see, Metestasnathean, _I KNOW YOU TOO_. " The Lord said, manifesting a sword and blurring over. When Metatron immediately recovered and did likewise, the Lord promptly intercepted.

The flash of golden-white light lit up the whole room as Metatron caught the sword in his right hand and stopped it completely.

The Lord saw the Titan's calm eyes for less than a second before his sword was shoved back against his face, causing another explosion of white-gold light and throwing the Lord backwards with an angry, surprised yell. He hit the ground once in turn before his shadow form broke apart, Metatron skidding over next to Raven from the redirected momentum, sparing her a brief smile.

"When you bind souls with someone to siphon their essence and stay alive, an in-depth perspective of one another is one of those side-effects you never hear about. It makes you actually understand him," the boy mused, tilting his head. "I could even _be_ him. Drives him mad."

"_**ADAM…" **_The Lord snarled, reforming.

"Bold italics. Those are so we know he's mad."

The Lord's response was to hold out the necklace, before dropping it on the floor and slamming his foot down onto it, grinding the jewellery into the stone beneath.

"_**You will yet learn." **_The Lord said.

Metatron's eyes followed the move, remaining fixated on the battered trinket for a long extra second of eternity. When he looked back up at the Lord, his face was slack, until a new, different smile bloomed. A smile like a fox, with an undertone of peace.

"Don't do that." Metatron said, his tone gentle. "You know better than to do that."

"_**YOU WILL YET LEARN." **_The Lord repeated, manifesting two new swords and blurring towards the Titan.

* * *

"…Alaryce?"

She said nothing. All she could do was stand there, hands frozen in their act of mixing. She'd gone back to baking. It was only an act, a stupid act with no means to an end. The power was out, so cooking the batter was out. Something to do. Just keep moving. Just keep swimming like the Pixar fish says. Ryce's hand crept up to her neck and chest where a familiar weight was absent.

"Ryce," the man said once more.

"Don't Dad. Jus'…jus' don't," she spit out in a defeated sigh, hand falling back to her side dead and heavy.

The other hand began to mix again…and her jaw gritting into a bitter grin.

"We'll all learn."

* * *

Marissa wasn't sure when she had landed. The last part of the fall she had remembered was her shoulder striking something as she plunged down, transforming her descent into a chaotic tumble that she'd endured for several seconds before blacking out. She'd woken up with her face pressed against smooth rock, and for a moment she thought she was back in Ginnungagap again.

The small fires burning around her, providing the barest modicum of light, quickly made her realize that that was not the case. She was where she had fallen, the burning wreckage of the Jabberwocky strewn about her…

Unhurt. She'd fallen who knew how far, striking at least one object on the way, not to mention her exit from her control room via explosion…and she felt no pain. Her only issue was a mild upper body stiffness that began to fade as she got up, looking around. She managed to recall the button on her belt that triggered her light source, hitting it and causing a potent flashlight to pop up out of her shoulder armor and illuminate the room, a design decision Marissa had subconsciously borrowed from 'the enemy'. There was nothing in it save her and the ruins of her machine, the room's giant cavernous walls and ceiling looming all around her. Marissa had no idea where she was, how she would get out…and if she should.

She'd failed. She hadn't been able to kill Robin. Her greatest war machine, and it couldn't even kill one human man. She'd squandered the Lord's gifts.

Yet…she was alive. Alive and without pain. Her adaptable-metal armor was still on her, its personal computer systems fully functioning. If she had failed, why hadn't he left her to the death or suffering she'd earned?

Maybe it wasn't over…maybe she'd been mistaken about Robin disappearing. Maybe he'd fallen in too, somehow, and she was tasked with finishing him…she could do that. He may have been a Bat-scion, but he'd endured far, far more than she had this day. That might give her an edge…

_Soyoureturntous…_

The rasping whisper that spoke less to her ear and more inside her head broke the small amount of determination and bravery Marissa had, her terror exploding through her.

"_Is that what's screaming in the basement?"_

"_Yes…Do not go down there. Any of you. You likely will not survive the experience."_

She was in Etemenanki's depths. Where the Lord had bound the foul spirits who had already tried to murder her. Now she was back in their grasp. Alone. Abandoned.

_ANDSOMUCHWORSE!_

The swirling mass that ripped out of the wall hurt her eyes, like her vision couldn't fully process what she was looking at and her body was being damaged in even trying. She had no scream, she had no breath, her chest locked like it was in a vise.

The force impacted on her and shattered like a wave against a cliff, the shrieking going from inside her head to all around her as the incompressible mass smashed up against the wall. Marissa's metallic gel-mix shifted, and then began leaking black smoke that swirled around her.

_**Vile things…**_

"Sir? The girl managed to squeak.

_**They have learned nothing from their suffering. The same cannot be said for me. This room has an exit, Miss Mori. Find it, the escape code is CONRAD. Do not fear these echoes of atrocity. They hurt you once. I forbid them hurting you again.**_

_YOUCANNOTDENYUS!_

This time, Marissa was struck from the side, the black smoke blunting and casting aside the malevolent force. Said malevolence refused to yield, battering at Marissa and trying to get its hooks into her. After several seconds of such futile efforts, Marissa finally began to run, doing her best to get her hammering heart and hyperventilation under control. Her master had told her there was an exit; she had to find it.

He hadn't abandoned her. He could have, but he didn't. Even now…

The laughter ripped into her ears, only for the smoke to flow up and turn the hurricane of noise into a dull echo.

_Ohlookitseekstohidethetruthf romthemurdererstill._

Marissa ignored the voice, looking around the long stretches of the room, trying to find a door.

_WHYWOULDHECARE? YOUTHINKHECANCARE?_

Ignore it. They were remnants of human crimes so severe they couldn't move on from the world. They'd tried to drive her mad and then drown her, and if not for the master's protection they'd have tried to do it all over again. Find the door. Get out.

The dissonant aura crashed down in front of her, seemingly to block her path. It failed, as Marissa ran through it.

Then she wasn't in Etemenanki's dark levels any more.

She was in a basement apartment, one that had clearly been lived in by a typical bachelor. But the mess of dishes, clothing, and other scattered junk had been completely superseded by the newer, greater mess of blood and viscera, the crimson splattering on the walls and floor in constant, repeated sprays.

Marissa froze as she looked at the sight. The liquid did not touch her, but her sight was captured elsewhere. Her ears heard the frantic, low agonized groans, the sound of something that should not be alive, still was, and was being dragged to death in as harsh a manner as possible. Saw the long thin sword, studded with barbs, slashing out again, and again, and again. The blood…the mess…

The RAGE…

The black smoke surged out, and the image around Marissa shattered, bringing her back to the basement of Etemenanki. The darkness, however, could not strip the sight from her eyes. The horror of it all…

_Wehateyou…_

_KILLYOU._

_Butyouknowwhatyouarewhatyoud eserve. SowhydoesyoursaviorLIESODEEP LYTOYOU?_

Marissa wouldn't have listened if she knew what to make of this, but she didn't, so she didn't. Her balance wobbled, but ultimately she managed to turn around and stagger-run…

The cat.

Skin like sackcloth. Eyes of cruel blue void. Gears instead of flesh…

The flash of the feline was gone as quickly as it appeared. Letting out a low, keening whine, Marissa staggered forward. Where was the master? He had spoken to her…

_Anecho…_

_Worthlessthanwhatyouare…_

_Butifyouwishtorelyonechoes…_

_THENECHOESAREWHATYOUSHALLHAV E._

* * *

Everything hurt, and what didn't hurt felt like it would never feel anything again. Raven, however, refused to let that deter her. She hadn't yet, and when it came to what she had to give, for her teammates, for her family…

There was no bottom to that well.

"_My friends…"_ Raven said, speaking not with her voice but her mind. She did not technically have telepathy, but what she did have in the way of mental powers, along with her magical knowledge, allowed her to create a fair facsimile. Normally, she would have had to have worried about the Lord picking up on it, but at the moment, he was too busy chasing Adam around the room to try and carve him to pieces. _"Hear me…speak."_

"…_everyone report in."_ Robin 'said'. Even after all he'd endured, the mantle of command never wavered.

"_Alive…" _Cyborg said.

"_Damn it all…" _Gauntlet.

"_Sophie?"_

"_Here." _The alien and mortician, the former having asked for the latter.

"…_Gar and Tara are unconscious, but alive." _Raven said.

"…_Kory?"_

Raven had no answer for him.

"…_is anyone here capable of fighting?" _Robin said.

"_My power's running so low I'm not sure if I can even get up."_ Cyborg said. _"Raven…can Metatron do this alone?"_

Raven didn't know what to say.

"_I'll take that as a no." _Gauntlet said. _"What can…we do? Call for help? Go…find a big red self-destruct button? Anyone pack a…PDEM?"_

"…_for now…stay down. At the moment…we're a liability for Adam." _Robin said.

"_So Metatron can't do it, AND we'd just get in the way of the job he can't do?"_ Gauntlet said.

"…_possibly on both counts."_

"_Fine…but I'm going to be on a hair trigger."_

"_Robert…do you even have any…bullets left in your gun?" _Sophie said, sounding more bemused than she felt.

"_Maybe not, but you ever been pistol whipped?"_

"_Guys, I hate to deny you humor…but __**can **__any of us actually fight?" _Robin said. There was no answer. _"…damn."_

"_This is not over, Robin."_ Raven said.

"_No…no it's not." _Robin said.

"_So what are we going to do?" _Cyborg said.

"…_damn well hope that Metatron has a good REASON why the Lord dislikes him so much."_

An explosion sounded from across the room, and the Lord skidded to a stop through the scattered forms of the Titans. If he noticed their communication, he gave no sign of it, as he dropped his ruined swords with an icy clatter, the shadow constructs breaking apart into smoke on impact with the ground. He'd swung the blades so hard, they'd broken when they'd missed. No matter. He had more where those came from.

"So… Adam. How long can you keep this up? Actually, I know the answer." The Lord said, Metatron landing near the room's left wall. A second later, the Lord sliced a flaming mass out of said wall with his taloned hand; Metatron dodged aside at the last second, once more. "NOT LONG ENOUGH."

"…that pun was painful. You know, the quality of your wit has really deteriorated over the last few chapters." Metatron said, bounding away as the Lord followed.

"Bugger's stealing my lines again." Gauntlet murmured.

"Keep changing the subject. You might be a quality and OH SO AGGRAVATING nemesis, Adam, but you have limits. Here? I have none. Raven could not best me, her companions could not best me, your oh-so-well-prepared friend didn't even come CLOSE. What can YOU do, besides draw out your death?"

"Well, I suppose I could do several things: Bring down this tower, seal the rift by disrupting the careful array that keeps it open to begin with, make the Foreverwhere explode, trigger a jump and take you along into an unknown world that is more likely than not filled with sunlight and leave you stranded, force you to miss your small window of opportunity for the ritual, or, if need be, I could ensure the Titans die painlessly."

"Heh." The Lord said. "Can you adapt to my speed?"

The blurring kick knocked Metatron into the air, and the Lord followed it with a crushing axe-hammer blow that crunched him into the floor.

"Because I'm adapting to _yours_. Oh yes, and those options you listed? No you can't, no you can't, no you can't…and it goes on like that."

"I hope I don't have to tell you how childish you sound."

"Childish for the CHILD!" The Lord snapped, more explosions ripping across the room that Metatron dodged. The Lord just gave one of his dark chuckles at the sight, though, more spheres of black manifesting around him, floating around in no apparent pattern. "You never answered my question. Just how long can you keep this up?"

"Longer than your patience can withstand it, I'd say."

The Lord paused, something like uncertainty marring his expression, before he visibly forced himself to relax.

The spheres failed to hit Metatron despite this, holes smashing open in the wall, Metatron already on the other side of the room.

"…heh. I guess you did pay attention in those times before." The Lord said, staying where he was, cloaks settling down on his body. "Does it bother you, Adam? That none of these people you consider friends remember why? Even NOW? Oh I know you'll never speak such things out loud…but really. That lack of memory is why the other you died in the hotel. Or what you claim was another you. I guess I'll take your word for it."

"…hm, you really don't know me that well, do you?"

"Oh really?" The Lord said.

The sound was a mix of glass breaking and metal tearing, a crunching shriek that sounded across the room as the Lord re-appeared on the other side. He held out his sword, or rather the ruined hilt it had been reduced to, the blade hitting the ground and exploding into mist that faded away. Metatron turned around with his own flourish, the faint glimmer of white-gold light settling back into his palm.

He hadn't missed that time. Neither had Metatron.

"The devil's in the details. First thing you taught me." Metatron said.

"…heh. Was that your plot then, Metestasnathean? You knew the Collins child would over-prepare, and so when I dealt with him, I'd think I'd have no problem with your usual bag of tricks? And all the while, you'd picked up a new one. What IS that, anyway?" The Lord said, cloaks snapping as he turned around once more. "I don't recall thermokinesis coming with the secondary ability of magical disruption."

"It was a gift. From my, ah, father."

"Your father." The Lord's words dripped scepticism. "The human man who took one look at his inhuman children and ran away so fast and so far that even now you have no idea where he is. Yeah. I'll wager he was always the missing piece."

Metatron dodged away from the piercing lasers the Lord fired, the dark explosions pelting the fallen Titans with painful shrapnel.

"Sort of like how you're the missing piece for the Titans. Oh, except…they never noticed you were gone."

"…Interesting. You are REALLY lost on how to react to me, even now. Is that why you keep scrambling for weak, clichéd barbs to throw?" Metatron asked, and dodged once more as the Lord sliced the wall behind him in half, dust exploding from the wound as the room beyond it exploded. "I'm just going to cut to the chase: You can stop talking. It's okay. Just you and me here. I promise, if they ask later, I'll sing homoerotic songs about your prowess and wit. You don't have to try so hard."

More craters were smashed in the floor as the Lord fired beams from his eyes, Metatron avoiding them with practiced refinement. Letting out a low growl, the Lord traced a sigil in the air before grabbing it and slamming it into the floor. The dark crystal and rock blazed red, and a storm of barbed chains and blades erupted from the floor, impaling into the wall beyond and the ceiling. Of course, Metatron was no longer standing on that part of the floor, having gotten behind the Lord. Though he said nothing, the Lord's face was enough to demonstrate his mood.

"…So that all went right over your head, then?" Metatron sighed.

"I apologise, your miniscule achievement of staying alive makes it difficult to take in your words." The Lord said, manifesting yet another sword.

"I don't understand why you think that's a small achievement, considering it's the reason I'm winning."

The Lord chuckled briefly, and then his arm blurred as he slashed out his sword, firing deadly cutting arc after cutting arc. Metatron didn't even move from his spot to dodge, the wall behind him collapsing as the Lord finally stopped swinging.

"'Cause you see, all that everlasting, Foreverwhere power…it's all right over there," Met continued as if nothing had happened, "Ready for pick up. And you can't go to it because you can't stop talking. Something to be said for OCD saving the day." Metatron said.

"…we all have our indulgences." The Lord said. "What was it you said, Morning Child…about it just being you and me? Well then…"

The Lord vanished, shadow exploding into being over Robin, a boot slamming into his chest and pinning him down, shadow tendrils seizing his wrists and ankles to keep him from retaliating.

"Who. Might. THIS. Be?" The Lord said, and raised up his sword.

Metatron didn't give any warning. He didn't even react. One half-second he was there, and the next he was going directly for the Lord.

Who never took his eyes off the Titan.

Metatron did likewise. Which kept him from seeing the sigil he stepped on. With a crackling roar, Metatron was smashed upward, hammered through the ceiling and out into the open air, further and further until he vanished into the ash-choked clouds.

"How's that for cutting to the chase?" The Lord said, and vanished into another twisting void of shadow.

* * *

Movies gave all sorts of misconceptions about guns. They sounded like bombs when they went off. They always punched very clear and very messy holes in people. Their bullets always went exactly where the gun was aimed at. They always killed.

Guns did not always live up to entertainment.

Their handlers, however, sometimes did.

Marissa could only watch as she fired the shots throughout the morgue. She had no idea why there were security guards in a morgue, but there were, and she was killing them. Worse, she did so with a completely blank expression, the only indication of emotion being in the focus she used to put bullets in the head and neck of the men before her.

_WERETHEYGIVENACHANCETOBEJUDG ED? ORJUSTSWEPTASIDEBECAUSE?_

Marissa closed her eyes and grabbed at her head, but the images followed her. Her own self walking through the morgue, opening one of the random refrigerator units and drawing out a corpse, breaking its rigor mortis-infused fingers to get at the ring on one of the corpse's fingers. With said ring, Marissa (or was it?) strolled back through the new bodies she had left, pausing twice to shoot two of men in the head again. Just to be sure.

_ColderthanthecorpsesYOUROBBE D!_

Marissa went down to one knee, the image burning up in her head, and as she blinked her eyes open, she found herself back in the basement of Etemenanki, the ghosts of Poveglia continuing to howl around her. She was still protected from harm, but the sights they forced into her eyes…

They made no sense. She could vaguely remember fetching a ring for the Lord once, something about 'keeping Amethyst off my scent', but there had been no murders, no executions. Where were they getting these images from?

_YouthinkusliarsYOUTHINKUSLIA RS!_

Marissa pushed herself to her feet and stumbled on as the spirits roared in pure fury. She felt the pressure on her head as they tried to claw their way back in, to turn her around and keep her down here until…

_FOOLFOOLFOOLHISLIESWILLDAMNY OUWORSETHANUS!_

Marissa kept going, the shrieking boring into her ears.

Only the flashing red dots saved her from walking right past the door, which was crammed into a carefully positioned rock cleft that blended right in with the wall unless you saw it at a precise angle. A wave of force erupted from the cleft, but Marissa was only driven back a step before pressing on. What was the keyword?

_Noescape…_

Marissa punched in CONRAD, and the door opened with a quiet hiss. Marissa ran through…

Then she was in a school hallway. A school hallway soaked with blood.

Marissa whirled around. The door was gone. When she whirled back around, the corpses were there, strewn across the hallway. Compared to what had befallen them, gunshots were a mercy.

Marissa started backing up, until one of the girls twisted their head and looked at Marissa, blood and worse leaking from her ravaged eye sockets.

"Why did we ever do to you?" The girl said. "You think all of us knew? All of us ignored? If you were us…what would YOU have done?"

The Lord's protection covered many things, but Marissa's own panic was not one of them, as she began to flee down the hallways, desperately trying to escape the bodies, the blood, the accusations…

"You could have gone to the police…"

No, no, they weren't here, none of this was…

"You could have just killed him…"

She had never killed anyone…

"You could have been so much more…why did you become a cruel murderer…"

There had to be an exit…!

The loud, rumbling crunch stopped Marissa in her tracks, and as she looked up, the roof was ripped off the school.

Above her, the Lord loomed, gigantic, but unlike the neutral expressions he always wore with her, this time his face was filled with distaste.

"_**Can't get anywhere with her like this. One side's a cringing sheep, the other's a rabid dog barely kept on her leash. I have to fix this."**_

Marissa stared up with unblinking eyes. What was he talking about?

"_**I don't have time for therapy, and drugs are a band-aid on cancer. I need to make the problem work for me."**_

"Sir?" Marissa whimpered.

"_**So I'll just cut her in half."**_

_ANDHEDID!_

The school caught fire and burned away, and Marissa was back in the basement.

_YOUBELONGDOWNHERE! YOUARELIKEUSRUINEDBROKEN! HATEWITHUS! SHRIEKWITHUS! UNDERSTANDWHATYOUARE!_

Marissa ran. She didn't even care where she was going any more.

_Theresnowheretorun._

_YOUCANTRUNFROMYOURSELF._

_YOUDONOTSERVETHEDARK. ANYMORETHANWEDO._

_YOUAREDAMNED. EVERYONEHEREIS._

* * *

Metatron could not breathe ash, but fortunately, he didn't have to. The clouds were the apex of his upward momentum, and after a few seconds he broke out of them, plummeting back down towards the ground. Spinning around and facing downward, Metatron narrowed his eyes as the island rushed up to meet him, his vision blurring briefly as the windshear stung his eyes. Flipping back over so he was heading towards the ground feet first, Metatron wiped his eyes and waited.

The island went from a black mark against grey waters to consuming Metatron's vision. He still waited. Details of the many scars of the battle that had happened there began to come into clarity. He still waited.

When he had a hundred feet left, he began thrusting out his arms in a rapid shuffle, golden blasts of steaming mist erupting from the ground, Metatron plowing into the first eruption and riding the cascading lengths of them down, each blast consuming a bit more of his momentum before he hit the ground. He still made impact with the force of a car wreck, the Titan tumbling across the rocky ground for several dozen feet before he turned the last tumble into a spinning flip, landing on his feet and leaping off to land on a prominent rock outcropping.

The shadow blurred over him a second later. Metatron jerked his head to face it.

There was a brief spark around Metatron's head as the two forms made impact. But in that spark…

A lifetime.

* * *

"_**Do you ever wonder about the arbitrary things they chose to question, Metestasnathean? How they'll accept some impossible things at face value, and go over others with a fine-tooth comb? Have you ever noticed they never question anyone who's escaped the realm of Death, yet endlessly mistrust anything from the realm of Delirium?"**_

_Darkness. A dull, throbbing pain. Moist earth beneath my nails – all around me._

_It feels like swimming through lead, mostly heavy and sluggish. My breath comes in short, golden bursts, briefly illuminating my bruised, cut-up knuckles, and the endless grime before me._

_Couldn't think. Couldn't grasp. What had happened? The beach. The Titans. Slade._

_**Get to the top.**_

_Aura._

…_I think she might be dead._

_My hands broke through the mud, then, and I push myself to the surface. The sudden fresh air racks cold through my body, and I collapse into the loose patches of grass and earth, missing the suffocating warmth it provided._

_Cemetery. This is a cemetery._

_I don't know why that's significant._

_My eyes roam, I pant. I don't know…I don't know…behind me._

_Behind me…_

ADAM ALEXANDER MATTHEWS

1982-2001

An errant soul, that now has peace

_I think…_

…_was I dead?_

"_**But why would they question death? Drake's proceeding and succeeding name bearers both died, yet returned. The changeling's 'parents' were thought dead and gone, yet they returned. The earthmover stands with you because she was believed dead. The soldier as well. You battled the dead, and went into death's very embrace to take back a child of it. To them, to you…death is another aspect of a complicated life. Not a finality. Not the final finality. Isn't that what you told them?"**_

"_There can't NOT be an answer, Matthews," the white-haired man growls. It was grating, so I looked around him, to the familiar faces. They looked older and more confused than I remembered. _

_Harder. _

_Five years, huh. Five years of changes. I probably have no chance of escaping from this group by force. Should have thought of that before agreeing to step into their home. Funny, I don't think I'd ever been inside before. _

"_Are you listening to me?" _

_He was talking? "You were talking?"_

_Ah, he's giving me the 'you're insane and I will punch you' stare. _

"_You may not care," he replies, tightly, "but people do not come back from the dead as an everyday occurrence. You have a history with my team – if you're who you are, if you're back, I want to know why. I need to know everything you know about it."_

_I tilt my head. I always like how people look at an angle. Helps me think._

"_Have you ever seen another dead-now-live person? Did they exhibit an abundance of understanding regarding their situation that you expect me to share? I'm alive," I say, "that's all I know. The why's aren't really a pressing issue to me. Just have Raven try to figure it out when she gets back."_

_In the end, she didn't._

"_**Yet…if they'll accept life returning to the dead…why will they not accept a comrade taken from their memories? It has happened before. They've taken memories themselves, of what occurred. Yet they do not believe you. They accept that YOU think it's true, but they themselves do not. Then again, perhaps that is simply your curse. Did I kill you in that hotel, Adam? Did you battle in that crisis in the Arctic? Or were those just echoes of other times, briefly brought into focus and then gone again? Perhaps being unable to remember you is less their fault than your own. The price of chaos."**_

_I crashed through the mirrors in the cold room the tape had stranded me in. It had actually been an accident, I tripped into it: I had just decided to sit and wait for the cold to lull me into cold-sleep death. I'd probably be brought back by the end anyway. Isn't that how it works? Funny way to die._

_I ran through much more freezing depths, resolve in my step, fury in my eyes. Collin was dead. I hadn't even NOTICED. I came for the Superboy. I had catharsis waiting._

…_But neither were me. Shadows of what could have happened._

_The Chaos took them all. It's no more. That's okay: I like myself as I am._

"_**Perhaps a more accurate thought…they saw what Collins did, in the battle against that world consumer. And so much more, before that. Yet why can I divide them so easily? Why, instead of suspecting you, the piece that no longer fits, or the child of death, who I so overtly worked with, do they break down so badly over Collins? If they had such deep-seated issues, why did they not raise them before? Does a family not stick together through thick and thin? If they shatter under such an obvious strike…were they ever really a family to begin with? Would they if they knew what we did, once again?"**_

_I am in darkness again. _

_**I am darkness.**_

_My roar shakes the ruins of the Juggernaut, chipping at the metal in its walls. Its fat corrupt cancer of a population flees like bugs, knowing they can't get far._

"_LORD!"_

"_**Robin,**" I hear myself say as my tattered friend lands before me. "**I don't mean to be rude, but I recall tearing a hole through your chest.**"_

"_One more time," he snaps grimly, levelling his absurd red-and-yellow sword at me. "Let him go."_

_The rest of my friends limp to surround me. My body was of shadow, shifting lazily as my golden eyes glowed from within. It must have somehow been funny, because I chuckle._

"_**Am I to assume there's a threat in that?**"_

"_We will hunt you to our last breath," Sophie snarls through bloody teeth. I didn't see Nigel. Perhaps _he _was dead, at least. And maybe the good mortician was too, seeing as she couldn't even stand. "No matter what happens, you will not escape this place. Even if we die," her expression shifts to anguish, "…Adam…please…can you hear me?"_

_I must not have found that funny._

_They become blurs as I move, as I lift Garfield by the back of the neck._

_That's where the dance starts, a chaotic blur of kicks and claws, of roars and laughter._

_The dance ends when with my last step onto Rae's face, pinning her on her back, the broken ground beneath her. _

_She's glaring. It hurts a little, but I _had _just beaten our family to pieces, so it's hard to blame her. Besides, she's mostly doing it to have something to focus on, to not fall unconscious. She's failing._

"_**Apologies,**" I said, "**there's a certain…feral aspect that comes with using this body. I'm not free of its influence, so I AM indulging in its bloodlust. I'd be lying if I said I was unhappy about this side-effect.**"_

_She glares still, so I don't see it when the beeping orb sticks to my chest. It's hard to miss, and I look to its thrower._

_A red-haired woman, in one of the prisoner uniforms of the Juggernaut._

_Her smile is child-like._

"_**Troy.**"_

_My chest explodes._

_It reforms quickly enough._

"_**Or if they remembered what they did then?"**_

_The scream tears the creature that had been in my body, the concentrated, large-scale magnifying glass destroying it._

_It probably takes longer than that. But after keeping it at bay, after wrestling my body back and fighting it off while my friends tried to come up with a plan. After its taint forever changed me into a being that its power could not entirely touch…it seems like too brief an ending. _

_I find myself lying on my back in the aftermath, just breathing._

"…_So, it's just you in there?"_

_I look up to Noel, and don't hesitate to nod._

_He doesn't hesitate to offer his hand._

"_Good."_

"_**With how deeply I affected them…why do they not see?"**_

_The battle in Metropolis was brief, full of sound and fury, fire and shadow._

_The cataclysm of the Twice-Born Well tore its mines asunder. They have never recovered. But Ricky never obtained its crystals._

_The fires of the Wolf nearly killed us both, until we saved each other. I don't know if he'll ever forgive me for that._

_When I killed the boy so that he could not use him on the ritual, I think he was unnerved._

_He led the Wild Hunt against me, tried to keep me from reaching the Wheel of the Demons Three first. That one was my loss._

_I fell into the Casket while fire exploded around him in the brittle forest of the Neither. He never really thought I had died in it._

"_**Why, Metestasnathean, do you insist on these people? Why, when they don't remember you, when they don't, in their darkest hours, live up to the ideals that once granted you mercy? Do you really not SEE? Do you just INSIST on it? Do you hide behind the lie that it must be one, since I speak it? Are you really smarter than you look, and stupider when it matters MOST?"**_

"_What does that mean – protect me?"_

_Aura always asks the silliest things._

"_It means…no matter what, I'll be here for you," I smile and she rolls her eyes, hiding her own smile. The blades of grass tickle my back comfortably, and my sister gives in to my pointed stare, sitting next to me. "It means I love you. It means…we're on our own," her smile dims a little, "but we're not alone. And if you look back, you'll always see me, looking down to you."_

"_I don't need a babysitter, Adam," she chides._

"_You have a brother," I grin. "One that'll always be there to catch you if you fall."_

"_But you weren't."_

_My grin shifts into something more peaceful, and I look up at Ryce. Her mismatched eyes look sad, but looking at them still makes me smile. "But I wasn't."_

"_It wasn't—I mean…"_

"_It wasn't my fault," I shift, and she takes the hint, lying next to me to hug. I never have to have to say anything with her. She always knows. "I failed."_

"_But you didn't!"_

"…_heh," I hold her close. "No. I did. But I won't again. Not with her. Not with you."_

_She looks at me with one of her fascinating expressions. She wants to ask something, but is trying to gather up courage. Silly: I always want to hear what's on her mind._

"…_Do you…see me as your sister?"_

_I blink. _

_That's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard._

"_No," I say, kissing her temple. "You're my Ryce."_

_She seems happier the rest of the day. I like that._

"_**I have no doubt you'd die for them, Morning Child. Nemesis. But if you think it will end so simply-"**_

"_ADAM!"_

_It's the Juggernaut again, and I am screaming._

_My back arches painfully, my friends try to help._

_My chest bursts open. A long vertical line along it…and the darkness pours out._

"…_No," Raven recognizes it._

_The black spreads, consuming my body as I scream._

_**I am darkness.**_

_In the haze, my eyes shine._

"_**Titans. The night is here, once more.**"_

"_**-Then YOU refuse to ask the right questions, as well. And so I WILL PROVIDE THE ANSWER."**_

* * *

The light and darkness sparked around Metatron's head again, before the shadows whirled away and reformed into the Lord. Metatron blinked, then crouched, massaging his knees.

"Missing the wings yet?" The Lord said, his dark cloaks settling back down on his body.

"To be honest, no. There's something about freefalling. More relaxing." Metatron said. The Lord, rather strangely, let out a deep sigh.

"So that's the way you insist it continues, Adam Matthews? I speak to you the truth, you either pretend it doesn't bother you, or you're so deranged that it legitimately doesn't, and then you pillar me with insults and words that undermine my goal, and I attempt to brush it off, and so it continues. Ouroborus. The snake devouring itself. Perhaps quite fitting metaphorically, but even you must be getting tired of it." The Lord said, raising an arm. "Look around you, Adam. Is this really what you want for this world, the one your lost family defends? You've seen more than them, and I see what you've seen. You see where this ends. You see how it mirrors where we stand."

"This is not the WORLD." Metatron said. "This is an ISLAND. _YOUR _island, made to look like this as a result of YOUR ACTIONS. So you can see why I'm reluctant to agree with your plan despite your tenth grade debate tactics."

"And how many _**WORLDS **_have you seen that look just like _**MY ISLAND?**_"

"Hundreds." Metatron replied, not missing a beat. "Thousands. For just as many reasons. Worlds end every day, and any single quirk of fate could have us all swallowed by the White any second of every day. So what? Nothing suggests that you winning would destroy that possibility for all of creation. Nothing says that in stopping you, it all changes either. But I walk into worlds all the time, and acting like doom is sudden and inevitable would just make the trip pointless and boring. I fight you because that's the side I choose to take, and you've never said anything for me to reconsider."

"…heh." The Lord said, holding out a hand, power crackling on his form that began to cause dust and debris to rise up around him. "Against the positivism which stops before phenomena, saying 'there are only facts,' I should say: no, it is precisely facts that do not exist. Only interpretations."

"That's Nietzsche again. Are you pulling a Noel on me?" Metatron said, tilting his head. "Did you pick up a few things while you were whispering in his ear?"

"Why waste original material on you, Morning Child? Old, dead words for your old, dead mindset. An idiom for an idiot."

"Oh, alliteration and old, used words. I have something for that pot." Metatron said, pointing. "Noel Nuisancing Neruda."

"_**What?" **_The Lord said, looking behind him. There was no way Collins-!

There was no Collins.

What there was was Metatron's glowing fist driving its way into the Lord's chest.

The Lord did not scream. Not this time. But the fact that the ground for half a mile around shattered into a million pieces spoke more than the Lord's voice ever could. Once again, Raven's exhaustion proved a boon: the pain that slammed into her mind might have potentially knocked her clean out otherwise.

There was more to it than traditional pain: Raven had felt enough of that from the Lord, in this war and others. There was something else in it too. For half a second, Raven had flashes of her shames, of the secrets she'd hid from her friends and what it said of her as a person. And she was just getting a brief flash of it, through a filter. The Lord was getting it full bore, and the pain from it…

"…gnnhhhh." The Lord said, black smoke and mist leaking from his mouth and from the wound Adam's fist had made, the glow ripping into the Lord's shadowy form like a horde of wild animals into raw meat.

"I saw myself killing my sister to save my own life," Metatron said conversationally. "What did YOU see?"

"…_**I…SEE…"**_

The grip on Metatron's wrist burned. Not from heat, but from the sheer level of toxic essence that was leaking out of the Lord's body as he grabbed the half-demon's arm and began dragging his fist out.

"_**BLACK…LIGHT. I SEE…PURE…AND IN THE PURE…"**_

The Lord slowly dragged Metatron's hand out of the wound he'd made.

"It burns you too. _**YOU**_. Not as much as me, but for all your determination and claim…it can't see past your blood. You would…cast judgment on me with this? _**WHAT WORTH IS JUDGMENT FROM SOMETHING LIKE THIS?" **_The Lord snarled. "Is this what your 'father' thinks of you? So little that he gives you a weapon that tells you how unworthy you are of it? You claim nothing I say convinces you otherwise, _**WHAT DO YOU THINK THAT IS**_?"

"…I think it's a weapon, doing what it was designed to do." Metatron said, his tone even with the flesh on his wrist seemingly on the verge of bubbling right off the bone. "I think it should burn me to ashes upon touch-probably would Raven. Yet, it doesn't. It doesn't fight me. It tries its hardest to cooperate, but it just won't…"

Metatron yanked his arm free, spinning and arcing his glowing arm towards the Lord's head, the ground ripping up as the Lord teleported twenty feet away.

"With me as its wielder." Metatron said, rubbing his scorched wrist. "It's not a judge, it's a nepotist."

"Interesting choice of words-"

"You'll carve them on my tombstone?"

The Lord's expression went pitch-black, even for him.

"Predictable."

Explosions ripped across the island as the Lord unleashed another blasting storm, Metatron outpacing it before he ducked, sliding along the ground with his momentum as the Lord's manifested blade carved the cliff face behind him in half.

"Also predictable."

The Lord blurred away and slammed his hands into the ground, the myriad blade attack tearing itself up through the earth. Metatron almost seemed to frolic as he dodged and jumped amongst the blades, doing a last second dodge backwards before the Lord blurred through the air, aiming and failing to cut his head off, and then using a blast of golden heat to throw himself into the ground when the Lord bounced off a cliff face, the force of the momentum causing it to crumble into ruin, and came back for a second try at decapitation.

"That too."

The Lord jumped directly into the air, but Metatron ducked again when the Lord, instead of attacking, punched his hand into a portal and tried to rip out Metatron's neck from his immediate side. Landing after the failed misdirection, the Lord went back to the quantity well, rising up and manifesting a black orb that bloomed into untold thousands of blades, the land in front of the Lord transforming into something akin to a porcupine's back and the air turning into bladed death.

Metatron had started running the moment the Lord landed, and as the blades flew out, he did a 180 degree turn so tight he barely slowed down at all and ran up a slight incline, leaping high into the air. The majority of the shadow spears flew beneath him, and the ones that went at a high enough angle to strike were dodged with a few twisting spins. The blades faded away into smoking mist a second before Metatron landed.

"Again again again, Ricky. And now you're about to attack fast enough that even though I know it's coming, I won't see it and won't be able to sto-"

The Lord snapped his fingers, and clones of himself manifested all around Metaron, their mouths opening and vomiting out acidic smoke. Metatron dodged backwards to avoid it.

His dodge ended up taking him further than he expected, the Lord blazing over to follow him, his cold black fingers seizing Metatron by the throat.

"That would be further adapting."

The Lord whirled around and smashed Metatron through the nearest large rock he could find, Metatron's scream of pain echoing across the island.

"To your speed, and your announcing my tactics to me. You're not the only one who can think fast, Morning Child."

Metatron said nothing, limp in the Lord's grip. The dark god snorted and dropped him, the Halfling falling at the Lord's feet as he raised one of his own.

Perhaps the Lord had been preparing to compensate for Metatron's dodge. Whatever the case, he made the wrong choice; Metatron didn't dodge.

He punched the Lord's foot instead.

The blast of white energy nearly blew the pseudo limb clean off, and with a bellowing roar the Lord staggered back, taking half a second to recover his balance.

Long enough for Metatron to get back up and slash the Lord's throat open ear to ear.

The Lord didn't breath, didn't bleed, didn't function like organic beings. None of that seemed to matter. The burning haze that exploded through his body felt worse than what a legitimate cut throat, bad enough that the Lord collapsed to his knees, grasping at the wound.

Metatron didn't say anything. He just slashed his hand at the Lord's head.

This time, half a second wasn't enough. The Lord blurred forward, his hand seizing Metatron's throat again. Metatron's glowing hand burned away the Lord's arm like paper, but his grip endured, the black line tearing across the island, ripping up the ground in his wake. A spray of cold water was Metatron's only clue over how the ground had changed, and then the cold water closed over him, the Lord's hand driving him underwater.

"_**NOT…GOOD…ENOUGH. IN ALL MEANINGS OF THE PHRASE."**_ The Lord's voice thundered in Metatron's head. _**"I'm afraid you came back with the right tools and intentions too late, Adam Matthews. Far, FAR too late. And I'm also afraid you don't get to run off again. Not this time."**_

The gigantic pressure on Metatron's throat increased with the Lord driving his own self into the depths, slamming the Titan down onto the ocean floor in a cloud of black silt. Somehow, Metatron kept the impact from knocking the air from his lungs.

Flashes of light lit up the dark depths, Metatron hammering away at the Lord with the strange white power he possessed, while simultaneously setting off more detonations of golden heat in the Lord's body. The hand did not waver, pinning the Titan to the ground. Twice, Metatron successfully slashed through the limb, only for writing shadows to immediately replace the grip and keep him in place.

"_**Like you said. Soul bonds. That's the problem with connections, **__**Metestasnathean. They go both ways. And I have grown so very sick of you GOING away when things are just getting INTERESTING."**_ The Lord said, his voice scratching across Metatron's brain. _**"Go ahead and do me harm. Whatever pain you can inflict on me is NOTHING compared to the grievance of you returning to your eternal loose end self. I've set the chains on you. Now, the garrotte."**_

The young boy's claws hand clasped itself tightly unto the black arm, as if trying to pull itself up with its support. The grip was already loosening.

"…still not over it…are you…" Metatron 'thought' back.

"…"_**I have done that", says my memory. "I cannot have done that" - says my pride, and remains adamant." **_The Lord said, and tightened his grip all the more. A few bubbles escaped from Metatron's lips. _**"AT LAST. MEMORY. YIELDS."**_

Metatron's hand finally let go, and fell into its personal abyss.

"…_**Right then. That's it. No jumping away. No friends coming to save you, all of them broken in my wake. No aid from the caged one-armed bird. Poor Adam. Nothing left in the end. No family. No sister. No hope. YOU SHOULD HAVE JUST STAYED IN THE GRAVE."**_

Metatron's eyes snapped open.

"I couldn't. I'd yet to sing the song that ends the world."

In the shifting morass of black silk, there was the slightest hint of purple.

* * *

She should have been raging.

After all, that had been the pattern. That had been the never-ending, mind numbing cycle that watching all of this had set into motion. Every slice, every punch, every cutting word spiralling the maid further down into her darkest parts. Into those deep corners of her that no one ever talked about, because there was something wrong in her. They loved her anyway because she could keep it deep. Her hate for the shadowchild for the pain he was visiting upon him tasted like blood and bile and something tarry and sweet in the back of her throat. She should have been raging.

She had seen the purple.

Ryce smiled and somewhere a Door rattled.

* * *

"…_I may have something."_

"_Cyborg?" _Robin 'said', the Titans still scattered and semi-broken on the floor, only able to wonder what was going on out of their sight.

"_Bastard…ripped me apart pretty damn good. But he didn't think to…get rid of the solar battery I used for my weapons…" _Cyborg said. _"I can't shoot any more…my systems are too damaged, even with Noel's repairs…but if I dump everything but life support power into it, I think I can overclock it. Make it explode."_

"_I'm going to assume this won't kill him." _Scalpel said.

"_Maybe?"_

"_Unlikely." _Robin said. _"What's the downside of this, Victor?"_

"_I won't be able to move at all for…fifteen minutes at least. And barely after that."_ Cyborg said. _"But, if I pick the right time…"_

"_Do it." _Robin said.

"_Just don't kill yourself. That's…bad." _Sophie said.

"_I'm not sure this is the best idea. I mean, this guy runs on Dragonball rules and the suicide attack never works in that." _Gauntlet said.

"_I'm listening if you have any other ideas Rob."_

"…_Suicide attack it is!"_

"_It's not suicide! I'll just be without any weapons or any power and unable to-damn it Rob, I liked it better when you hadn't talked."_

"_So did I. Let's rewind. Great idea Cy! I'll cover you!"_

The sound Metatron made as he leapt-stumbled back into the room was an odd mix of squishing clothes and nails on a chalkboard, as if Metatron had overestimated how fast he was moving and had to drag himself to a stop on the floor.

"Maybe I should have taken that manicurist appointment." Metatron coughed, his cheerful tone reduced to a more ragged croak.

"…Adam?" Raven said, staring in shock. "…what…what happened?"

"Oh please don't tell me he beat the Lord offscreen. We didn't just go through six wazillion pages of buildup for that!" Gauntlet said, this time out loud. Most of the Titans could speak; they just hadn't wanted to on the off chance they were heard.

"Is that a lot?" Metatron said.

"It's so big I had to make up a number and multiply it by six to count it. I mean, where's the Lord?!"

_Metatron's head broke the skin of the waves, the Titan gasping air into his tortured lungs. For several long seconds, all Metatron could do was breathe._

_Then he remembered he was in the ocean. Filled with cold water. Really cold water. In the old days, Metatron would have ended up sinking back into the depths almost as soon as he'd emerged, if he'd even found a way to get back to the surface._

_These new days…he just hurt himself a lot by forcing his slowing abilities to immediately boil the water around him. It bought him the few seconds needed to break out into a swim, Metatron exploding blasts of heat behind him via his legs to add further propulsion. The sand grated on his body and sprayed into his face and hair as he reached the beach, but he barely noticed, looking back towards the dark sea._

_Lightning crashed down in the distance, a boom of thunder following it several seconds later. The Lord did not emerge._

_So Metatron ran._

_He ran like the Lord was right on his heels._

_In some ways, that would have been preferable._

"Talk later…" Metatron said, as he mostly walked/slightly stumbled towards Raven, collapsing before her. "Ow. I just did that to make sure my knees still feel pain. Prognosis is good."

"Adam…what happened? Where's the Lord?" Raven said.

"Not dead. Sorry. Gave it the old college try. Must have been the Southern University in New Orleans try….that's the worst college in America, by the way. I looked that up online. Noel was ticked at me. Said that's not what he meant by 'think ahead'." Metatron said, his hands crawling over his outfit while he tried to locate something. He paused, looking disoriented for a second, and then his eyes violently snapped into focus. "Everyone, brace yourself. We probably don't have much time and when the Lord comes back, he's going to be upset."

"…I think we passed that point a while back, Adam." Robin said.

"No. You've made him angry, hurt him, made him sadistic and murderous…he's like that all the time. You've never made him _upset_…hell, _I'VE _never made him upset. I'm a bit concerned."

"…What did you do?"

…_Where was Metestasnathean?_

_He'd had him, dead to rights and rightly dead…then…had he somehow jumped again? No, no trace of the signature that left. He'd just…_

…_what did he do._

_WHAT DID HE DO?_

"I can't say. I mean that literally." Metatron said as he finally pulled a black vial from a fold of leather near his knee. "My own amrit, Raven. I thought I'd be drinking it, mainly because I didn't see myself feeding it to you. But you can use it better…" Metatron said, grabbing Raven's chin with his hand and locking eyes with her. "I swear though, if it's fake, I am out of here."

Raven could only nod. Metatron gave a lazy grin, popping the top off the vial…

The wrenching pain slammed through Raven's jaw, the Lord blurring through the opening Metatron had created, hitting the Titan so fast and hard that Metatron, for once, never saw him coming, his fingers yanking on Raven's face before the momentum broke his grip.

Even through the pain, the black vial floated in the air to Raven's eyes. Metatron had lost his grip on that too.

A sight taken as soon as it was given, the Lord sweeping out his hand and smashing it across Raven's face, throwing her backwards. The vial and its liquid contents hit the ground, hissing as the Lord's foot came down on it.

"_**W**_…HAT…d_**IDy O**_u DO…"

In Robin's experience, the best way he could have described the Lord's voice was the hitching some people suffered from when they were trying to talk while sobbing. Except it was…uglier. The sound of someone in tears, mixed with the sound of someone biting down on a razor blade and of meat seared by fire, the fat bubbling from the flesh. What in the hell, _ANY _hell, had happened? Metatron had taken something that drank human suffering and grief like fine wine and he'd…what? Made him swallow poison? Given him a sense of clarity? WHAT?

Robin knew what, in the end.

The answer made him get up. Somehow. Get up and throw himself at the Lord.

The Lord walked through him, his form distorting around Robin's body and reforming as the Titan leader collapsed in his wake. He didn't even seem to have noticed the effort.

"_**WHAT DID YOU DO!?"**_

"This is gonna suck." Gauntlet said in a quiet voice, and then got up on his knees and aimed his arm, pain shooting down said arm and shoulder as the Gauntlet energy reached out, grabbing onto the Lord. The Lord didn't break stride in the slightest, reaching up and peeling the energy off like it was a child's sticky toy instead of a weapon on par with a Green Lantern ring, leaving it limp on the ground as he stalked towards Metatron, who was barely managing to pull himself out of the crater the Lord had made smashing him into a wall.

"…that sucked for reasons I don't even want to know." Gauntlet said, the Lord closing in on Metatron, arcs of energy beginning to rip into the floor around him. Metatron, blood running down his face from a cut scalp, slowly managed to push himself up, staring at the wrathful presence that loomed over him.

"_**cccccccHHYYYYlllEEEEE…"**_

"…Derp." Metatron said, and poked the Lord's nose.

The three seconds that followed felt more like hours.

"_**RARGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHH HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"**_

Tendrils slashed out, seizing onto Metatron and smashing him into the ground, hurling him back into the wall before the Lord drag-threw the Titan across the room, grinding a passage with the Halfling's carcass before dumping him on the ground. The tendrils surged back to the Lord as he snapped out an arm, blast after blast consuming the wall in explosions. It was horribly inaccurate by an offensive standpoint, but as the old saying went, quantity had a quality all its own. It did well enough that Metatron lay collapsed on the ground when the Lord blew the smoke away, stalking back towards his enemy.

"…You know what? It doesn't matter." The Lord said, his voice back to normal. "What you did doesn't matter. What you _say _doesn't matter. Not in the long run, the long game, and in the morality system none of you have the SLIGHTEST UNDERSTANDING OF, OR ELSE YOU'D BE _**HELPING ME."**_

Another shadow tendril yanked Metatron up, the Lord pinning him to a wall.

"But none of you can handle the understanding. You hide behind delusion, lies, idiocy. If you saw what I've seen, understand what I have, your minds would snap in half…"

"…I've seen what you've seen, first hand." Metatron mumbled. "Come on, Ricky. It's nothing new. You just don't like that it-"

Metatron's voice cut off as the Lord's grip became throat-crushing.

"Verily, a polluted stream is man. One must be a sea to be able to receive a polluted stream without becoming unclean." The Lord said, his gaze burning into Metatron's eyes. "They also say all the world's a stage. Well, it's time for the final act. Which means the fools, and the Fool, have to go. Alas, poor Falstaff. Mercutio. Puck. I knew…"

Cyborg stood up and threw the overcharged power core like a grenade. It had been agony gathering it up, waiting for just the right time, knowing that a few seconds could mean all the difference…

The Lord lifted a hand, a portal appearing and consuming the power core, closing back up as it blew God knew where. Cyborg could only stare before he crashed forward onto his face.

"That the second I got my senses back, I should scan you lot for plans. THANK you for insisting on being YOU, Morning Child, and bringing me back. To my old self who knows how you pieces of shit ALWAYS YANK MORE SHIT OUT OF YOUR ASSES. Like I said. Fools."

Cyborg had no reply. He couldn't do anything else, save stare in horror.

"…fuck my donkey." Gauntlet muttered. He was too broken to think of anything more clever. The Lord turned back to Metatron.

"So. Was it worth it, Adam? Was all the frustration you so gleefully dumped in my lap worth it? Because I warned you, Morning Child. Over and over and over again. There would be…"

The bullet slammed into the Lord. All he did was blink.

Morgue, leaning against the wall, barely able to keep her arm up, fired off a few more slow, disorganized shots. Each of them struck, but none of them did anything. It wasn't until Sophie's arm gave out, the useless weapon thudding to the ground with a muffled clatter, that the Lord looked over at her. After two seconds, he looked back at Metatron.

"A reckoning. But your kind never listen."

"…I…like Soph." Metatron managed to choke out. "Always…my favourite…had more power…than you ever will. You talk about potential, and bad things in people, and how you understand…but if you understood, well…we wouldn't be here."

"You're right. We've gone in circles long enough." The Lord said, raising a hand.

"Always so certain you have everything covered…always miss the important." Metatron said.

"…Collins?" The Lord said, flicking his eyes behind him, his senses scanning out…

"Wrong half."

The Lord's senses washed over Raven half a second before he felt the gate slam shut.

"No." The Lord said, letting go of Metatron and turning around.

Raven was back at her feet. Standing before the Foreverwhere, her back to it, her hands raised. The unnatural brilliance illuminated every wound she'd taken, and despite them all she'd never seemed stronger, her hair blowing around her face and her soul self twisting around the void.

"What words did you offer some time back, you wretched beast? That Robin should take up the power? The power you need to function now, after all you wasted trying to prove your worthless POINTS?" Raven thundered. "You're right. This is simple. Simple enough for the child that wanted it so much. AND I AM NO CHILD."

"THAT POWER IS MINE!" The Lord snarled, his fingers blurring in the air as he drew magical runes and hurled them at Raven. She shattered them with a gesture.

"Amateur work. All of it. You dare rag on us being children? _You _act like you have all the finger paints in the world, as much as you want, and with that you can make art. All you can make is mess, and it's TIME TO CLEAN UP." Raven said, the power of the Foreverwhere arcing into her body.

"…You _**DARE? **_If you really wish to keep adding to your regrets, Titan, THEN FAR BE IT FROM ME TO SAY NO." The Lord raged, lifting his hands and sending bolts of energy burning through the air. Raven blocked them with one hand, the energy stopping dead before her.

Cyborg had watched through all of it, and as the clash began, he managed to turn his head towards Robin, who knelt where he'd landed after his own futile attack.

"…you knew." Cyborg said.

"…I performed a calculated risk." Robin said. He knew his team. Knew their strengths and weaknesses. And with Noel's return, he knew the best hope lay in Raven coming up with a plan, keeping it carefully locked inside her head where the Lord's general psychic abilities couldn't reach, and keeping the Lord distracted so HE didn't realize where he needed to direct his attention. When Raven had immediately rolled over and begun crawling towards the rift almost as soon as her 'amrit' had been stolen, he'd known he'd been in the right.

"…Do you have Rogaine in that belt, Robin? Because I think my hair's started falling out." Gauntlet said, having pulled the yellow energy back into his arm. "So we win, right? She just took the keys and she's gonna lock him out!"

"Of course. Because that worked so well with Emoboy Prime and the Phantom Zone." Metatron said, pulling himself back up via the wall behind him.

"Would it be possible for you to not inflict us with the jinx, as the saying goes?" Scalpel said.

"He never says die. You should have seen him earlier: I kept telling him to shut up and just fight, and it took me breaking him a little for him to listen."

The Lord's insane vitriol was all too evident to Raven as well. She'd suspected that Metatron was trying to slip her a coded message on what she should do ('I could even _be_ him' came to mind) before, but the final key had been when he'd uncorked his 'amrit'. Amrit had a very distinctive rotting-sweet smell, distinct enough that Raven could remember it vividly from her sole experience; when Noel had given her his. There had been no such smell from Metatron's vial. It had been a feint, to get the Lord to dismiss her once he'd 'broken' her false recharge. She'd already had vague plans in her head to do something with the Foreverwhere, but the amrit fakeout and what it meant had clinched it.

So she'd crawled over. For a moment, she'd had the surreal feeling of longing for her emotionless days; back then her heart wouldn't have been hammering so hard that it seemed about to beat its way out of her chest, as she tried to rework the spells that had opened the Foreverwhere rift and directed its power to the Lord. They WERE crude, that she hadn't been lying about, but she'd had to redo them without getting the Lord's attention…

Now she had it. Now she had the power…

…But that wasn't enough.

As graceless as the Lord's magical efforts were to someone like her, he was still the one who had practiced and trained on drawing on the infinite power that lay beyond the schism he'd opened. Raven, despite her surgical level skill to the Lord's battering-ram practice, was making this up as she went along. Not to mention that he wanted it back, and badly. And…

It spoke to her.

The _Aeternus Locus_ might have been used to grant newly-born universes the gift of magic. A single sentient mind of one world?

Raven, if she won, could do more then beat the Lord. She could snuff him out of existence. She could change time and undo everything he'd done, and then calm the existential waters once the paradox of her actions stirred them up. She could remake the world in her image, in the image of her teammates' dreams. She could save them from all their pain, take away everything they'd ever suffered. She could bring them to heaven, and the rest of the world as well.

She could bring back her mother. Noel's mother. All the lost parents and friends and loved ones. She could blow out Ryce's wicked, disgusting family like a birthday candle and stand up to Death if she opposed such a deed. She could consume all the evil of the world and seal it behind an infinite prison. She could do ANYTHING. She could be, like the Lord said, God and Superman and So Much More Beyond That…

And then she'd be him. The Lord. Maybe she wouldn't have his madness, his sadism, his cruelty…but at the heart of all his actions, the heart of darkness, was a desire to change the world for the better, per the eye of the beholder. What right did she have to take away everyone's choices? After she'd worked so hard to be human…what right did she have to play God?

She knew it…and yet she could barely resist it. The possibilities called to her. Just one action, one sole large action. She could do that, couldn't she? One big one…perhaps a few smaller ones…perhaps just shift some probability…

No. She couldn't. To fully accept the power would be to be lost. To even accept it to a degree would claim her. She had to seal herself off from it.

All the while keeping the Lord from reclaiming it.

_Who's going to die?_

….it was a price she was willing to pay.

"…Robert, NO!" Robin hissed, as Gauntlet tried to get back up, clearly wanting to throw another punch. "You don't know anything about magic, you could disrupt the process!"

"Or make it better?"

"We can't chance that. You want to help Raven, have faith!"

"…I really wish Gar was awake now…"

"_**RARGGGGGGGGGGHHHHH!" **_The Lord snarled, his voice sounding like breaking glass and snapping bone, distorted cracks of energy beginning to race along the walls and floor as the two waged their almost-invisible war.

"You're…nothing…in this regard. You can do…nothing…" Raven whispered.

"In a purely magical duel in a vacuum? Maybe so, Titan. But this is MY world. MY dream. You think you can just walk in and take it away? Do you think I would be utterly ill-prepared for such IDIOCY?" The Lord said, as he redrew more symbols and sent them blazing towards Raven. She shattered them again, but the motion was less confident, less impressive. "Oh, stop it, hero. There's no one around to impress. You can't win unless you become me, AND YOU KNOW IT."

"Liar." Robin said. Audibly, he knew no one could hear him over the noise that was consuming the room. Where it mattered, though, he knew Raven heard him.

"So THIS is what you want? Throw away the power, lock away the lunatic, all smiles and cookies then? So who are you going to blame the next time everything goes wrong? Who are you going to blame when it turns out I'M RIGHT?" The Lord snarled.

"Don't know, but we'll do it better than you." Cyborg said.

"This is my world! You can't just walk in and master it!"

"The words beneath your words speak differently." Scalpel said.

The Lord briefly stumbled, falling to one knee. The moment of hope was short-lived, with the darkness god standing right back up, cloaks of black mist rending the air around him.

"You. Will. LOSE." The Lord said.

"You…lost before we came here. Before we even met." Raven said. The Lord stumbled back, falling to one knee again. Raven could sense the leverage was on her side, the momentum. Perhaps the Lord was second to none at kicking down doors…

"…So what will be worth it, blackbird? The pain you'll cause them? Or the pain of knowing you couldn't do ENOUGH?" The Lord said.

The reality of her last thought surged over Raven along with the Lord's words. No, she couldn't listen. She had to focus, she had to finish this…

"Oh damn it." Metatron sighed.

The arcs of energy surging around Raven began to split off. For two seconds, they flowed out into the Titans…

Robin felt some of his exhaustion and pain fade away before the Lord's own essence flared up in turn, the relief cutting off like a switch.

"…You just can't help it, can you, Raven of Azarath?" The Lord said, his darkness looming over the room, devouring the light Raven was summoning from the rift. "Do you think your world raised you without a heart solely because of your lineage? No. They understood. It's not worth it, in the end. All the love and companionship…it all led you here. It always does. To moments like this. You know what's going to happen. And when it matters MOST, IT'S LACKING."

"You wanna bring up how you're burning up all your power just to stop her from cutting you off?" Metatron said, the Lord snapping his face towards the Titan. "That's like a junkie overdosing to keep someone from stealing his next fix."

"….Ah, Metestasnathean. Always the fly in my ointment. So tell me, why don't you come over here and stop me? Oh right, you can't. And if any of your friends try, they'll die. Good thing Robin has the brain you don't. Not like it matters." The Lord said, turning back towards Raven. "She can't win."

"Then…I'll make sure…you don't…either." Raven said.

"And I will make damn sure that the last thing I do is snuff out any chance of a miracle you heroes could drag out to bring you back, now or any other time." The Lord said. "Was it really worth it, child?"

"You…would never understand." Raven said.

Then she herself fell to one knee. She'd tried to resist the power, tried to fight uphill against the Lord's work and will, tried and failed to not use it save to cast it away. It was in her nature. She was an empath, she knew pain and wished for it to end, for herself and others. When the Lord had called out his threat that no matter what she did, she'd cause pain, she'd reacted on a subconscious level. Her soul had spoken…and her body would pay the price for her answer.

"Raven, NO!" Robin yelled. But his voice was wind, and could only be swallowed by the howling gale within the chamber.

"…Who is the great dragon whom the spirit will no longer call lord and god?" The Lord said, his voice speaking in the Titans' minds and souls. "'Thou shalt' is the name of the great dragon. But the spirit of the lion says, "I will." "Thou shalt" lies in his way, sparkling like gold, an animal covered with scales; and on every scale shines a golden "thou shalt." Values, thousands of years old, shine on these scales; and thus speaks the mightiest of all the dragons: "All value of all things shines on me. All value has long been created, and I am all created value. Verily, there shall be no more 'I will.'" _**Thus speaks the dragon.**__**"**_

"…you know, that's always been your THING, hasn't it Ricky?" Metatron said. "You can't just win, no no. You have to ANNOUCE it. But you don't wanna risk whatever you said lacking IMPACT, oh no, that just won't do at all. You'd think you'd just write down something on your wrist for later, but why do that when you can just borrow something from somebody else? After all, your stole your power, your motivations, your act and style and dance, why not just top it off with words?"

"You still lose, Adam." The Lord said, and as he coiled his fingers, Raven's soul-self and the Foreverwhere energies began to be drawn to him…

"You keep using that word. I don't think you know what it means." Metatron said, as the Lord turned towards Adam, just a bit, eyes glowing with rancor. "I can't beat you with annoying words, I can't beat you with the truth, and I sure as hell can't beat you in a fistfight. But funny with all those things, I'm always winning, because, in the end, keep your John Bartlett, I HAVE A CHUBBY UNDERTAKER!"

Morgue didn't have anything to add. Just one last bullet. And the strength to squeeze the trigger.

The gunshot cracked the air.

The Lord turned it pitch-black, the energies washing over the room, gravity slamming down across all the Titans, time seeming to slow in synchronicity, the bullet going from burning through the air to burrowing through it.

"After all you've brought before me that I brought low, do you REALLY think that-"

The Lord stopped talking as the bullet promptly flew PAST him, the shadow god snapping his head to follow it as it flew into Raven's hand.

"No."

Raven immediately gave the bullet back. With everything she had left.

The sound of the shot was lost in the greater explosion, the Raven-charged bullet ceasing to exist even as it disrupted the Lord's immensely complicated and delicate spell-weaving, power-stealing, and general efforts of will. The end result was the Lord exploded like a pig corpse suddenly pumped full of gas, a scream reverberating across the room as the gravity and black air ceased as quickly as it had come.

Raven staggered backwards and fell onto her side, barely avoiding the shadowy murk that sprayed across the whole room from the Lord's violent destruction. Robin felt some of it impact him, and for half a second he felt rage and hatred and sadness on a level he could barely begin to understand, before the emotion passed and Robin doubled over, gasping like he'd been struck. Raven felt similar brief shocks in her teammates, before they passed. Echoes of a life they'd never have to bear.

Then the room was quiet, save for the crackling of the Foreverwhere.

"…I. Want. A raise." Morgue whispered.

"…did I miss the ending?" Beast Boy murmured on the ground. "Because this is one DVD I can live without."

"Raven? Are you okay?" Robin said.

"I…" Raven said, before she coughed, blood splashing on the ground.

"I'm sure if I was…a little more conscious…I'd mess up saying something snappy about a magic bullet…so for now I'll just say thank-" Scalpel managed to get out before his own blood spilled forth, hissing on the ground.

"How about joy cookies? Joy cookies sounds like a good thing…to say…" Gauntlet said.

"…oh no…" Cyborg groaned, the despair in his tone raking across Raven's mind and bringing her out of the fog. "Come on, NO…!"

"…oh joy cookies." Gauntlet said.

The shattered mass of black morass was stirring. Stirring and moving across the room. Gauntlet half-heartedly tried to squish one of the masses, but his overhead smash was so slow a turtle probably could have dodged it.

"Like I said…he never says die." Metatron said, pulling himself back up from where the explosion of the Lord's body had thrown him.

"Raven…please tell me you have a plan. Because I am fresh out of everything now." Morgue said.

"…I can't fight him. Not anymore. I don't have anything left." Raven said, as the mass reformed before her eyes.

"…As said. Such is the fate of titans before a god." The Lord said, his body flowing back into an upright, intact form. His shape seemed less solid, less clear, but beyond that his shattering had seemingly been just another false hope to be ground underfoot. "…though I will say this, Titans. I am grateful."

The Titans could only stare.

"What good is a man, a god, and everything else, what good are their skills if they're not tested? How better else can you judge a man's potential, save by his enemies? If something must be a plague on my life…let it at least be the foulest and most virulent of them. What does not kill me, makes me stronger."

Raven looked into the Lord's eyes. The genuine moment of twisted affection there turned her stomach worse than any of his hatred and cruelty. Because it reminded her that as much as he lied…there would always be truth in what he said. Somewhere. And the truth hurt.

"So I salute you, Titans. You broke my connection. And I doubt you're going to stand there and let me re-establish it fully." The Lord said, gesturing, a few trace sparks of the rift flying to him. "So then. I know Raven gave you a few of these sparks yourself. So come on then. One last final stand. Before the fall."

Then the Lord felt it.

The surge of sudden…joy. Joy in Raven's heart. Collins? No it wouldn't be that…

"…well, Richard." Raven said. "I hope this long struggle gave you an appetite. Because I think you may just be about to eat your words."

The Lord turned around as the orange hand ripped out of the void. Seizing the burning edge that would have carved through mortal flesh like butter and pulled. Emerged.

"…_that door…is one way; on the other side it'd just be a patch of ever so slightly different white among all the other white…."_

Unless you did something. Like say, raise a massive magical ruckus that sent constant blooms of darkness shooting into your perfect white as you sought more and more power…

"…_without my spells you'd have power shoved into your body until it exploded…I wonder how long you'd last? A minute? Maybe two? Just long enough to have proper regrets?"_

"…Kory." Robin said.

The Lord felt the joy bloom and spread, the sensation twisting into his gut even as the form fully came forth from the Foreverwhere rift. The Tamaranian had survived. Her alien lungs hadn't needed air. Perhaps in time she would have died anyway, in agony and despair…but that time was gone now.

Now she was back.

Now…she was her name.

She was a _star_, an engine of creation and destruction beyond all mortal comprehension. Her blood seemed to glow a deeper gold beneath her skin, and the green of her blazing eyes spoke of the energies that lay in ground zeroes and volcanic eruptions, of meteors striking worlds and supernovas. She was alive. She had returned.

She was angry.

"…oh dear." The Lord said.

* * *

The explosion nearly knocked Savior right off his perch. He yelled and crouched down, staring up at the eruption.

It wasn't like the blast that had taken him out of the fight when it had started. That had been a push with a lick of fire. The green explosion that blew outward from Etemananki was more like every single space shuttle engine on the planet being turned on at once, the green fury arcing over the horizon before it faded it. Savior barely saw the small black form tumbling down from the blast, striking down near the island's edge with a distant, thundering impact.

"…I knew he couldn't kill you." Savior said. "Word of advice, Lord. You probably shouldn't have tried to block that with your face."


	10. Invincible

Chapter 10: Invincible

"_Fata volentem docunt, nolentem trahunt.__"_

"The fates lead the willing and drag the unwilling."

-Seneca

"I'm black and blue, beat up, but still I take the blows,  
'Cause all I need is blood and sweat and skin and bone!  
I'll take this rage, rattle your cage, nobody said it's easy,  
It's do or die, only the strong survive!  
Get ready for the last stand!  
Get ready_**, I'M YOUR HANGMAN!**_"

-_Let Me Hear You Scream_, Ozzie Osbourne

* * *

_**What is madness?**_

_**Nietzsche said 'Insanity in individuals is something rare…but in groups, parties, nations, epochs, it is the rule…'**_

"_Leave me alone! LEAVE ME ALONE!"_

_**Edgar Allan Poe said 'I become insane, with long intervals of horrible sanity…'**_

"_Why? Why did you do this? I don't want to…I DON'T!"_

_**Johann Wolfgang von Goethe said 'We do not have to visit a madhouse to find disordered minds; our planet is the mental institution of the universe."**_

"_I don't want to kill you…this isn't my choice! It's yours! You're causing this killing!"_

_**Akira Kurosawa said 'In a mad world, only the mad are sane.'**_

"_God damn you…this is your fault! Your fault!"_

_**Oliver Wendell Holmes said 'Insanity is often the logic of an accurate mind overtasked.'**_

"_You made me do this…you made me!"_

_**Nikola Tesla said 'The scientists of today think deeply instead of clearly. One must be sane to think clearly, but one can think deeply and be quite insane.'**_

"_Fine! I'll kill you all! And I won't feel anything! Just like you! JUST LIKE YOU!_

_**Henry Ward Beecher said 'No man is sane who does not know how to be insane on the proper occasions.'**_

"_You aren't heroes! You're liars! You can't do anything! The world is better off without you…and me…BUT ESPECIALLY YOU!"_

_**Ray Bradbury said 'Insanity is relative. It depends on who has who locked in what cage.'**_

"_I HATE YOU ALL!"_

_**What is madness…**_

…_**Madness is slippage.**_

_**Madness is not like a broken bone or a bad cold. Doctors of the mind can write all they want about warning signs and signals; it does the bearers of madness no good. When it comes to madness, you never notice the ice beneath your foot until your foot is up in the air. By then, gravity has taken over. It brooks no disobedience.**_

_**Madness…**_

_**It extends so much further than people in straightjackets or committing multiple homicides. It extends so far that most don't even realize they're mad beyond the norm. They place new words on their insanity and act as if it has always been that way. It matters not. They're still falling. Always falling.**_

_**All that matters, in the end, is control.**_

_**Those who do not understand control will never have it. The window is brief and small, and lost once gone. Most never want it to begin with. They lack the understanding or the stomach for it. Ironically, it often means they throw accusations of madness. How expected, yet fitting…**_

_**What is madness?**_

_**Look in the mirror.**_

_**You're mad. They're mad. We're all mad here. The proverbial kingdom of the blind.**_

_**Do not fear, though. Like Odin, the nine days have passed. The tree is behind me. Thought and memory sit eternally on my shoulders.**_

_**Ragnarok awaits the mad.**_

"_Can't save anyone…look at all this shit…made a mess…made me make a mess…and you killed my cat! You bastard! You killed my cat!"_

_**H.P Lovecraft said 'If I am mad, it is mercy! May the gods pity the man who in his callousness can remain sane to the hideous evil!'**_

"_They all deserved to die, Robin! YOU ALL DESERVED TO DIE! BURN IN HELL!"_

_**Lord Byron said 'Hatred is the madness of the heart.'**_

* * *

To be mad…could mean two distinct things.

The Lord honestly didn't know if he was pleased or just so angry he'd gone numb with it.

On the surface, he was enraged. He'd fallen for it again. The Morning Child had been such an irritant that he'd completely overlooked the actual danger of both Raven and his efforts to stop her. Now the alien was back.

But beneath it?

What had he been thinking? Throwing her into his fount of power?

_You wanted to hurt her. Her and her fellows, over and over. They keep rising back up from it…is this not good? Should not the god of the world have to slay the mightiest enemies?_

**They should have been dead long ago…**

_That is no one's doing but your own. If you really regret it so much, rise up in turn. Be the final one to rise._

Black tendrils ripped out from the smoking pit that had been formed when the Lord impacted into La Voix, pulling him up and onto the ground, his cloaks flaring out around him, shadows roiling as they formed into bladed tendrils, his eyes blazing pinpricks against a void, shattered remnants of stone rising up in a field around him.

All very impressive, but the tiger's body, close up, was still perilously close to paper. He'd had virtually limitless strength when fighting Metestasnathean, and he hadn't needed it. When Raven had tried to seize his connection to the Foreverwhere, the battle they'd had over it had not only broken it, but forced him to burn through far too much power to keep her from cutting him off entirely, not to mention what he'd had to establish to keep HER locked out. He'd barely begun to re-establish said connection when the alien had returned. As he was now, he could have beaten all the Titans at their full normal strength…or at least the odds would have somewhat favoured him…

As _she _was now…

The floating masses of rock burned to ash as the shining avatar of green light and oblivion lowered down before the Lord, the mere glow of Starfire's skin sending needles of pain into the Lord's own. Worse, the Lord could read her body language well enough to know she was neither showing off, nor arrogantly declaring her superiority in her slow descent.

She was being cautious.

Cautious in the sense that if she slipped, she'd probably atomize the Lord's whole island and who knows how much Atlantic Ocean. That would, however, include her friends. So she came with measured care.

She had an organic body, which carried far more risk when you were thrust to these levels of strength, especially with no preparation. She had a warrior's heart and rage, ones the Lord knew he'd stoked to an inferno. Yet she came with calmness.

The eye of a hurricane that would consume the world.

_His _world.

Like hell. No matter what hell she could raise.

The dark nimbus clouds above had long been consumed by the black ash of the volcanic eruption Terra had triggered, ash drifting down across the island and sea waters beyond. Lightning pulsed furiously through the dark thunderheads, untold tons of abrasive ash mixing and spawning static electricity on a near-limitless scale, bolts occasionally arcing down and striking the dead rock expanses.

"…so. The heart beats still." The Lord said.

Starfire said nothing. She just SHONE.

"Nothing to say? No promises, no claims, no threats? Not needed, perhaps?" The Lord said. "Heh. The author must keep his mouth shut when his work starts to speak. But who is whose work here, Koriand'r of Tamaran? Are you yours…or mine?"

Silence.

"I suppose it doesn't matter." The Lord said, raising both his hands. "Where it _does _matter…_**YOU'RE MINE."**_

The Lord promptly blurred away, teleporting himself across half the island in a blink of an eye. Never do what your enemy expects.

The Lord had expected his enemy, with her current power, to catch up quickly.

In truth, the Lord was not _entirely _surprised when she caught up so quickly that she seemed to have teleported WITH him. It didn't help with his irritation.

"Hmmmmh." The Lord said, and teleported again, going upwards and away this time. To prevent any issues with the stubborn flying curse, he brought along a chunk of rock to levitate and stand on.

Starfire was in his field of vision even before it fully settled. The Lord tried to keep his face neutral.

"…that IS interesting." The Lord said. "You always could move fast, alien…but you were limited by atmosphere. Is your body absorbing the friction, or are you just ignoring it? Not wise to-"

The Lord blurred away once more. This time, it was a double-feint, the Lord re-appearing where he was. This time, Starfire's reading of his movements worked against her; she was so determined to meet the Lord where he emerged that the snapback caught her off-guard.

"IGNORE POSSIBLE ISSUES!" The Lord snapped, his hand manifesting a baseball-sized and shaped orb, the dark god hurling it at Starfire. She blurred away, the attack missing by a mile.

The Lord had expected that. Even as Starfire moved, so did he. And he had more where that had come from.

"Fleet of feet. But I doubt that the _Locus _made you as fleet of mind." The Lord said, summoning two more orbs and throwing them. Starfire vanished long before they arrived; the Lord promptly threw more, and more, and more, the air filling with destructive power.

"Ah, memories…recall that time in the desert, Titan? Remember what I did?" The Lord said. _**"THIS."**_

Lines began to shoot between the orbs, lancing through the air as the Lord attempted to encage the alien within his power.

Starfire got out in the literal blink of an eye. The her that would have fallen for that same trick was years gone…

Unfortunately, the Lord knew that too. This time, he was there to meet her, his claws lancing out. Starfire blurred away again, but the Lord was close enough to scratch her.

Her blood promptly destroyed his hand. The Lord endured it.

"Now THIS." The Lord said, his eyes flaring red as he worked the blood magic, and the black orbs all promptly converged on Starfire, the explosion splitting the clouds above her.

"Not good enough. Shame." The Lord said, and blurred towards the explosion-cloud, dark energies crackling on his hand. "What do you regard as most humane? To spare someone shame."

The expanding blast of destruction consumed the cloud in turn. The Lord remained where he was, reaching out to sense-

Starfire's hand surged out of the dark and clamped onto his wrist. The Lord snarled in alarmed rage, the alien's fingers burning through his form like the proverbial hot knife and butter, the Lord jerking away as his hand came off, breaking apart into shadowy mist. He immediately reformed his other hand and punched her in the face as soon as it became visible. This hand, his hand SHATTERED.

"You BITCH!" The Lord said, rearing back.

Starfire didn't speak. The noise she made was almost inaudible. The dismissive coldness in the tone spoke better than any speech.

"Fheh. The doer alone learneth." The Lord said, and blasted energy from his gaze, dark blades of energy lancing to carve out Starfire's eyes.

The glow in them brightened, and the blast stopped cold.

Then the glow became brilliance, and another explosion rocked the sky. Several seconds later the Lord crashed back down to the ground, the shattered remnants of his face smoking as they reformed.

"…this could be…something…of an issue…" The Lord said, before he spat more hissing blackness onto the ground. Hellspawned TITAN. He…

No. He had made enough errors. He wasn't going to wait until he got desperate. This had to be settled before it was too late.

Starfire hit the ground like a bomb. What was worse was that she wasn't even attacking, instead landing violently in front of the Lord, gold and green energies exploding off her body, burning up around her like holy fire. She was learning to control it. She'd already shrugged off his efforts, and that had just been with her struggling to keep the lid on. Now she was getting the reins…

Starfire's eyes opened. A green hell blazed within.

Reins she would fashion into a noose.

"…I teach you the Superman. Man is something to be surpassed. What have you done to surpass Man? Thus sp-"

The explosion lit up the island again, the Lord and Starfire vanishing in the eruption as she punched him directly in the face, cutting off his quote as she shattered his features.

She never saw the gesture.

* * *

"…now the rest of the world sees you just as we do." Sophie said, before a black energy claw pulled her away from the gap, the blazing explosion and the shockwave that came from it smashing through the hole the Lord had made in his abrupt exit.

"Bad idea to stare directly at a star, Sophie." Raven said.

"Titans, report in. Current status." Robin said, Scalpel working next to him to touch up the wounds Raven had not been able to fully heal with the little medical supplies he had left. Beast Boy and Gauntlet had managed to drag the motionless Cyborg to the wall perpendicular to the one with the hole, Raven having moved the still-unconscious Terra there as well.

"I'm feeling a little better than I was five minutes ago. Still like dried-up shit, but that's better than stepped on dried up shit." Gauntlet said.

"I'm going to need those fifteen minutes. At least." Cyborg said, his voice a semi-mumbling slur as he tried to work his jaw without any power to move

"I am out of ammo and weapons." Morgue said, before a black portal opened up and offered Morgue her jury-rigged rifle, lost during the latter stages of the Torment fight. "Okay, scratch that, I am NOT out of ammo and weapons…the dregs of a barrel are better than an empty one." Morgue said, checking her ammo count and if the makeshift firearm was still functional.

"Scalpel? I need honesty." Robin said, standing up. "Because even with Raven's efforts, I don't think I can go through all that again, and I didn't get it as bad as you."

"…what choice do we have, Robin?" Scalpel said, ripping a long strip off his cape as he spoke.

"Answer my question, Nigel."

"What happened to no names in-" A rather sickly sound of a wet cough escaped from him as a clawed hand raised to his lips. It prompted a growl, deep in his chest. "I'll be fine. We have to keep fighting. If we don't, every pain, every injury, everything we took from his first appearance to this…it'll mean nothing."

"I hate to break up the usual self-sacrifice bit, but I will remind you that the only thing keeping Ricky still going is the little he sucked off from that, right?" Metatron said, reminding the Titans he was still there; Starfire's abrupt return having proven something of a distraction. "And it's just sitting there, wide open and unprotected."

"Right then." Scalpel said, as he picked up one of his broken swords and hurled it at the rift. It just went into it, not affecting the void in the slightest. Raven winced as Sophie fired her rifle at it with the same result.

"Don't bother. It's not responding." Robin said, holding up a hand as Gauntlet moved to punch it. "Raven, can you close it?"

Raven was about to reply when she sensed it.

"Incoming, people."

"The Lord?" Robin said, turning around and cocking his fists.

"No." Metatron said. "But unfortunately, Ricky had the same idea you did."

The Abhorred arrived with quietly disturbing grace, dropping down through the hole and landing like it had just stepped off a curb. Robin winced as his mind swiftly calculated the damage that a normal person's ankles, knees, and legs would have suffered landing that way; the Abhorred had neither bent/knelt to absorb the impact, slowed its landing speed with any kind of flight power, or cracked the ground with the impact the way those with superhuman endurance. It had just blown in from outside, clearly going at considerable speed, and then had just…stopped. Many people wouldn't have noticed; to Robin it told him just about everything.

The gunshot that cracked the air and blew apart the Abhorred's head, which promptly reformed, told him the rest. It didn't even look at Morgue (and it lacked proper eyes anyway), instead starting to walk towards the Foreverwhere rift.

"…Titans, go." Robin said, and leapt in to the attack. No orders were necessary; what needed to be done was apparent.

So was the fact that the game had changed. Robin's dual feints before he surged in and slammed his fist into the Abhorred's side worked, but the Abhorred didn't react at all. Robin spun and planted his foot into the creature's chest; the appendage sank it and then was violently expelled, throwing Robin backwards. The Titans' body exploded with pain as he did a flip and landed, his body sinking into a crouch. Robin compartmentalized the sensation, his eyes drawn instead to where his fist had landed; only a faint trace of emitting black smoke indicated where he'd struck at all. Did his weakness somehow reflect onto the Fang shards he still possessed? Had he and his fellows hit the Lord so much with them he'd managed to work out protective measures? Something else?

"Does something else include that maybe it's BLUFFING?" Raven said, flying it, black arcs of energy leaping from her hands. The Abhorred bonelessly dodged backwards and then lashed out with an elongated arm, catching Raven and hurling her into the wall with a echoing crunch.

"Is it bluffing? Please tell me it's bluffing. I'll also take trolling, or…obsickleing or whatever…GRH!" Beast Boy said, clutching his side as his body seemed to go malleable for a half second and then snapping back. "That hurt. Someone else, please be obcitrusing."

"I…" Metatron said, before being cut off as Scalpel leapt through the air, roaring, having tied his broken swords together with pieces of his cloak, the makeshift weapon spinning around, Scalpel's hands blurring as he simultaneously swung and stabbed at the Abhorred. The first strike was dodged, but the second cut deep; too deep, the Abhorred proceeding to close in and backhand Scalpel, black blood spraying as the alien flew back.

"Heh. _Kusari-fundo. _Or maybe _surajin_…with a _kusarigama _twist…maybe watching all those old kung fu movies wasn't a waste of time after all." Gauntlet said, the remnants of his namesake power digging into the ground and ripping a chunk of rock out. "Or _Kill Bill_. METEOR HAMMER A-GO!"

"As I was saying. No Gar, just use…confused. Or bewildered, if you don't know what it means." Metatron said, while Gauntlet swung his bludgeon at the Abhorred, the shadow construct dodging around. Letting out a frustrated snarl, Gauntlet snapped one of his weapon's 'ropes' to grab onto the Abhorred and pin it down, only for the construct to do it one better and jump onto Gauntlet's mass of stone, riding it as Gauntlet swung it around. Gauntlet promptly tried to pancake it into the ground, only for the Abhorred to prove faster, insect-crawling onto the other side and leaping off as Gauntlet shattered his rock bludgeon, kicking Gauntlet in the face and sending him flying backwards. "Oh fudgesicles."

"Can you DO something? You went off to fight the Lord by yourself, surely you can fight one of his damn…head lice or something!"

"Sure, lemme go get some shampoo." Metatron said, while Robin leapt back in and fired off more fists. When the Abhorred grabbed his arms, he promptly headbutted the shadow. The shadow headbutted him right back; Robin took it worse. "In all seriousness though, I can either wrap this up right now…" Metatron said, cracking his knuckles. "Or I'm one hit away from falling over."

"…how do you NOT KNOW THAT?"

"I don't like paying attention to pain. It hurts me." Metatron said, and blazed across the room, explosions of golden heat exploding from the Abhorred's body. The construct staggered, Metatron's glowing white hand lashing out.

The Abhorred's foot got in first, the shadow construct pulling a cartoon-like dodge to avoid the blow, at the same time swinging its leg around and hammering Metatron upside the chin. The wall let out a hissing snarl as Metatron crashed against it, his heated body both melting and expanding the stone of the wall and floor, cracks firing out in multiple directions.

"…second one. Ow. More fudgesicles." Metatron said. "…great, now I want ice cream."

The Abhorred, despite knocking away Metatron, needed several seconds to fully pull itself back together, wisps of fading golden power leaking from its body. Cracking the neck it didn't have, it turned back to the Foreverwhere rift.

Beast Boy struck then, dashing past and clawing a chunk out of its body as a tiger. Scalpel leapt in to carve off his own chunk, only to eat his own foot to the face as the Abhorred leapt and did a slashing flip kick, knocking the alien back the way it had come before slamming its fists down into the ground, dark energies slamming up into Beast Boy and knocking him away with a cry of pain.

The Abhorred's head exploded again. The pieces swirled back together as it turned its gaze towards Morgue, who cursed and began trying to chamber another round.

The Abhorred promptly ignored her, turning and taking two more steps before it stopped before the Foreverwhere, holding its hands out as arcs of incandescent energy began to flow outward into them.

"No."

Raven's dark energies clawed through the empowering streams, cutting them off and yanking the Abhorred away from the rift, the construct immediately turning around and lancing out its arm for an extended stab. Raven blocked it, only to find the Abhorred advancing on her, stabbing at her again and again with extended limbs. Impossible…it had had three seconds to drain off power, at most. Surely it couldn't have stolen THAT much-!

Another bullet tore through the Abhorred. It ignored it, continuing to stab at Raven. Raven backed up a few more steps before going on the offensive, her own dark energies shifting from shields to blades, lancing out and meeting the Abhorred's rapid strikes. Gashes ripped open on the floor around the pair, the energies finally interlocking as the two warred for dominance.

The white line slashed down out of nowhere, ripping through the Abhorred's offensive energies. The Abhorred turned to see its new attacker just in time for Savior to surge forward and slam a Shimmer-empowered punch into the creature's chest, hurling it across the room.

"Nice dance moves. Can I cut in?" Savior said. His clothing was torn up, exposed skin showing ugly looking bruises and burns more often than not. But there were worse things. Like being dead.

"Noel." Raven said.

"Rave-" Savior began to reply, before the woman enveloped him in a crushing embrace, her words slurring into a incomprehensible noise of overwhelming joy. Not dead. Still alive. Here again.

Despite himself, Savior allowed himself a second or two to return the embrace, wrapping an arm around Raven and lowering his head, feeling her heart beat in twin with his own.

"Yeah." Savior said. For once, he was at a loss for words.

Raven was as well, yelling as she shoved her returned-from-oblivion boyfriend aside and blasted the Abhorred as it tried to siphon off power from the Foreverwhere again.

"Right, we can talk later!" Savior said, stabbing at the Abhorred with his own Shimmer lines, the shadow construct leaping around the giant room as Savior tried to pin it down. Morgue, having been mostly distracted in trying to load another round, promptly suffered a double-whammy of surprise when she not only realized Savior was back, but that a Shimmer line was offering her a half-broken gun. Specifically, the one he'd tried to use on the Lord before things had gone wrong.

"Solar power! Broken! Maybe you can fix it! Try! It's good!" Savior tossed over his shoulder when Morgue took the gun, the Abhorred flying across the room towards him, hands extended in rending claws. Savior leapt out of the way, rolling back to his feet, his spatial awareness picking up someone beside him.

"Savior." Robin said.

"Oh captain my captain."

"Nice to see you're not dead."

"Same."

"Please tell me you hung onto your Fang shards."

"I kind of put them in that mace weapon you saw that I kind of lost when the Lord blasted me out of my non-literal boots."

"So noted." Robin said, Beast Boy and Scalpel drawing up beside them as the Abhorred raced back to attack anew. "GO."

* * *

The tornado was pitch black, a combination of atmospheric trauma and magical eruption having produced the necessary conditions to birth it, its funnel tearing across La Voix like an accusing finger. Tornadoes produced some of the highest winds in nature, and wind normally blew out fire.

This time the opposite was true, as the eruption of green energy lit up the entire sky and consumed the twisting tower of wind, shredding it like tissue paper. Only the sharpest human eyes could have followed the black form that blurred in violent, snapping retreat away from it, the Lord reforming several miles away.

"Don't think you've accomplished anyth-"

Starfire appeared before him before he could get out another syllable. The Lord resisted the urge to take a step backwards.

"As I said. Don't think that getting one up on a weather pattern means ANYTHING!" The Lord said, twisting his hand and pointing it at the alien. The clouds above the Lord flashed, the Lord calling on the electricity crackling within to strike down on top of the alien, her form vanishing in an explosion of white.

The Lord vanished as well, blurring away. A thundering impact sounded, dust erupting off in a wave as the Lord's clenched fist met Starfire's open hand, her grip seizing on him. She'd not only dodged the lightning, she'd anticipated his move and countered it.

"And here we are again." Starfire said, speaking for the first time, her voice void of emotion, concentration and will evident in every syllable she spoke. "Such as you prefer it, Lord of the Night. Always returning to the same old, decrying the worth of anything new."

"Don't talk about things you don't understand, alien." The Lord said, before emitting an agonized yell and sinking to one knee as Starfire increased her grip. How? The last time she'd burned right through his body, how she was RESTRAINING IT SO QUICKLY-?

"I understand."

"YOU-"

Starfire's fist blasted the Lord's jaw clean off, his body flailing back, emerald rage erupting around her.

"Let me show you."

The Lord fired a piercing ray at Starfire in response. She zapped away, flying four miles in a second and returning in another, her fist smashing into the Lord's chest and sending him shooting backwards at even greater speed. Starfire's own increased even more; The Lord's body wracked under her blows as she hit him from seven different angles in a second and then blurred back to fire a Starbolt, the blast throwing him in another direction. Writhing shadows reclaimed their humanoid appearance in time for Starfire to blaze in anew, emerald blasts exploding from her hand and against the Lord before Starfire slammed both her hands together and fired off a blast three times as big as her. The explosion produced a mushroom cloud, the Lord flying through a cliff face several miles distant, finally recovering as the alien surged after him. All of the Lord's counter-blasts just hit dead rock, Starfire blitzing from side to side before she came up right into the Lord's face, miming a punch before she cut away, flying around the Lord in a blazing circle. When the Lord recovered from her fakeout and aimed to counter-attack, Starfire stopped and clenched her hand, a viridian Starbolt column erupting from the Lord and sending him flying up into the clouds. Starfire flew in after him, impact shockwaves rocking across the lengths of the dark plumes before the Lord's body flew downward with ferocious momentum, smashing a hundred foot crater into the ground from its impact.

Starfire's form appeared on the edge, the green shimmer around her remaining as strong as ever.

Clouds of dust and debris rose from the crater as the Lord floated back up, murder in his eyes.

"_**NOW I'M ANGRY."**_

The Lord held out his hands, claws snapping forth as he lanced at Starfire. She blocked with one forearm, the talons shattering on her armor and the energies around her.

"It won't help you." Starfire said, and blasted the Lord across the island again.

* * *

_Keep it up Kory, he has to stay down EVENTUALLY…!_

Raven thrust up her hands, her powers forming a shield and keeping the Abhorred from kicking her head off. _And so does THIS thing!_

The Abhorred seemed to determine to prove Raven wrong, literally staying up in the air and jack hammering its feet against Raven's shield, its final kick knocking it away from Raven before Robin could land his own kick. Landing, the Abhorred jerked to the side as Scalpel slashed out with his makeshift staff/cloth/sword weapon, only to end up impaled anyway when Savior grabbed the blade and re-directed its point into the Abhorred. Scalpel closed in, slamming his arm all the way up to the shoulder into the Abhorred, trying to treat it like any flesh and blood creature and yank something vital out. The tactic did not work, the Abhorred instead seizing Scalpel and hurling him into Savior, jerking away and wheel-kicking Robin in turn, before running in towards the Foreverwhere rift as it began to draw power once more. Beast Boy knocked it away as a goat, only for the entity to slither its mass around Beast Boy's own and resume its power-siphoning.

"WILL YOU STOP THAT!"

Gauntlet's second attempt to bash the Abhorred with a chunk of rock worked out a lot better, throwing the creature across the room. It made no sound, but Raven could almost sense a trace of anger as it bonelessly lifted itself back to its feet.

Whatever emotions it might or might not have had, the seconds it had claimed draining the Foreverwhere spoke much louder, the creature summoning a giant shuriken-like mass of darkness and hurling it at Raven. Raven blocked it, only to draw back with a hiss as the spinning blade remained in blade and tore into her shield like a buzz saw, the Abhorred leaping away from Savior's lashing Shimmer and blurring across the room, its fist slamming into Savior and nearly knocking him right out of Etemenanki again.

"Damn it. It's getting way too strong for the time it…ate or something!" Gauntlet said. "Raven!"

Raven read Gauntlet's tone rather than his mind, and with a wave of her hand summoning up a portal, Gauntlet punching through it and nailing the Abhorred into the ground when Raven opened the other end above his head. Gauntlet slammed his rock bludgeon down a few more times before he withdrew the energy. When the Abhorred promptly got back up, body hissing with black and white energies, he said a word Raven was surprised he knew.

"Hi there!" Metatron said, back on his feet and behind the Abhorred in a flash. The Abhorred proved a touch slower, the Titan dodging away from its backwards lash and then leaping about to avoid the bladed darts the entity fired at him. Gauntlet tried to punch the creature in the back, only for its inhuman speed to come out again, the Abhorred whirling behind Gauntlet and kicking him towards Metatron. Metatron helpfully grabbed the Titan, only for the Abhorred to slash the ground, blades erupting across the floor towards the pair.

"I don't think I can punch those." Metatron said. Gauntlet took the hint and smashed his rock piece down in the blade's path, stopping it like a candle being snuffed out.

"Now, let me start being the odd one again and we'll be getting somewhere." Gauntlet said, then said his very bad and strangely known word again when the Abhorred ran back to the Foreverwhere rift and began drawing energy again before Raven grabbed and hurled it away. "We can't play this chipping shit!"

"I will note that every second it's in here fighting us is a second it's not out there giving power to the Lord." Metatron said.

"That doesn't help us if we all die!"

"I never said it was a perfect plan." Metatron said. "Beside, you've had a good life."

"I'm not even twenty-five!"

"I said good, not long!"

Gauntlet's next reply faded in his throat as Metatron ran off, clawing for the Abhorred's head. For a moment, he debated joining in…

That moment was all the Abhorred needed to kick Metatron back into Gauntlet.

"THIS PLAN WAS ALSO LACKING-!"

"YA THINK?"

Scalpel's own direction remained the same, slashing at the Abhorred with his makeshift weapon before getting thrown across the room. He landed near Morgue, who remained crouched down where she'd been since she'd been freed from her bonds, furiously working on her own firearm and the one Noel had given her. Movement caused her to raise her eyes, Robin now crouched down by her.

"How's that going?"

"Lousy! I need tools!"

Robin tossed her a kit within two seconds. Morgue stared, and then stared again when she flipped it open and found the micro-laser cutters, welders, and magnetic-based mini-tools within were exactly what she needed.

"Your mentor is SCARY." Morgue said, before she realized she was talking to thin air. Robin had run back in to attack, firing off punches while Savior tried to do a dual flanking attack with Shimmer lines. Manifesting shields that were eerily like Raven's, the Abhorred ended up deflecting both sets of attack before Gauntlet creamed it from behind. Much to the Titan's grief, it immediately again made like some kind of hideously resilient spider and began crawling around the chunk of rock.

"Not THIS again!" Gauntlet yelled, as he first tried to dislodge the creature by swinging his piece of rock around, and then holding it still so that that Scalpel could leap in and attack it. Not only did the Abhorred dodge the attack, it promptly ignored gravity as it 'stood up' on the rock and knocked Scalpel away with a blast from its hands, crouching back down and scrambling over the surface of the improvised mace head to keep from being pancaked into the ground again.

"Okay, now you're actually starting to get into the demerit stage! I don't know just what those are, but _you're earning them_!" Gauntlet snapped, swinging and bashing his makeshift weapon around like a lunatic, and continuing to fail to dislodge the Abhorred.

"What's it doing?" Savior said. Robin had no answer, instead looking at Raven, who took half a second to ponder it herself…

Wait…was it moving itself to keep facing the rift?

"DAMN IT!" Raven yelled, and promptly smashed Gauntlet's rock-mace head to pieces with a blast of her own, knocking the Abhorred across the room.

"Hey! I know this isn't a time to call kill-stealing-!" Gauntlet said.

"It was absorbing power! From the rift!" Raven said as she flew past her teammate.

"_What? _While hanging onto the rock?"

"Yes!"

"…THROUGH the rock?!"

"UNFORTUNATELY!" Raven said, as she slashed down dark blades of energy, only for the Abhorred to blur around her and blast her in the back.

"Argh, this thing is so broken! Then again considering its maker, I'm not surprised!" Gauntlet yelled, ripping yet another chunk of crystal and rock out of the wall. "I'll splat YOUR book, you munchkin shadow piece of crap!"

The way the Abhorred didn't react in the slightest bothered Gauntlet on a deeper level than annoyance. Generally, enemies tended to react to the fact that the threatening noise was _making _noise at least; the Abhorred just turned around and made a beeline back towards the Foreverwhere rift before it was intercepted by Raven. It wasn't even machine-like, because a machine designed to combat would at least register threats. The creature was, in essence, a walking manifestation of the Lord's will and desire, without any of his hangups getting in his way. If it succeeded…if the Lord clued in on the wisdom of such tactics…

"Gauntlet!" Morgue said.

"What?" Gauntlet said, running over. Wordlessly, Morgue grabbed the laces on his left boot and yanked on the tight knot, cutting it off with a laser blade and unwinding the tempered plastic lengths.

"Thanks!"

"What the…what if my shoe falls off?"

"You can't make Gauntlet shoelaces?"

"IT NEVER OCCURRED! ARGH!" Gauntlet yelled, trying to run back into the fight and replace his shoelaces with his energy talent at the same time. "I LIKED those aglets! I knew their purposes matched mine!"

"I doubt aglets are _that _sinister…"

The Abhorred, in the meantime, was being ripped into by twin claws, courtesy of Scalpel and Beast Boy as a bear. Both attacks fell flat, and then the pair ended up even worse in terms of flatness as the Abhorred grabbed their arms, leapt into the air, and smashed the two into the ground like they were made out of paper. When Savior tried to grab the creature from behind, the Shimmer almost plunged into a mass of blades that sprouted from the Abhorred's back, and Robin's attack from the front was driven back by ferociously powerful blows, Robin diving back out of the way as the Abhorred whirled and exploded the ground in front of its body. Raven returned at that moment, her black claw of energy seizing the Abhorred, only to be driven back yet again when the Abhorred smashed her power with its fist, the backlash stunning her and allowing the Abhorred to hop back over to the rift.

Every second it stood there, power leeching into its form, passed like an eternity for Raven. It couldn't have been more than four before Metatron finally got back into the fray, golden steam exploding from the Abhorred's body before the lost Titan slammed into it with a flying kick. The blow knocked the Abhorred away, but it also let the creature grab Metatron by the ankle and spin, its arm extended to smash the half-demon into the nearest wall. Raven's follow-up blow knocked it further away, but the Abhorred just lashed out its hands, power arcing off its nails and ripping through Raven's shield, forcing her backwards and ripping burning lines into the floor.

Raven promptly borrowed a trick from Gauntlet and the still-unconscious Terra and smashed a rock into the creature's blind spot, shoving it away. Gathering herself up, Raven moved to strike again…

The movement near her caught her eye and stopped her cold. For a second, Raven thought the Abhorred had grabbed up enough scraps of power to clone itself.

The blade that swung at her was not shadow, but it moved with the same disturbing liquidity, Raven barely able to dodge backwards to avoid it. Her eyes went wide as the light of the room illuminated the newcomer.

"_Marissa?!_"

Marissa's expression stared back at Raven's. Her outfit was surprisingly clean, with no obvious wounds, but her face…

So much chaos around them, and her face was blank. Her eyes were dead. They didn't even seem to register Raven.

"Off with her head…" Marissa whispered, and tried to decapitate Raven again, her blade shifting to the task, nanites manipulating a mercury-esque metal. Unlike the Abhorred, Raven's shield stopped it.

It didn't help, as Marissa kept slashing at the shield, over and over, like a skipping record. Raven instinctively reached out to try and bring the girl back to her senses, only for the yawning void she found to cause her to nearly lose her concentration, and in turn her shield. Despair sank its claws into Raven; she'd hoped Marissa was just being manipulated by the Lord, but she hadn't felt a trace of the shadow-god within her. Instead, she reeked of the dead…

The dead that roiled in the black pits of Etemenanki. What the Lord had started, they'd finished. She'd become an automaton with only faint traces of anything resembling intent, barebones of survival instincts which were firing off simply because of the sheer damage done to the woman's mind.

"Little hands make vain pretence…" Marissa whispered. Slash. Slash.

The Lord had broken this woman. Robbed her of key emotions that, when confronted with endless, primal fear, should have been there to serve as options. But they were gone now, and so was Marissa. The lights were on, but nobody was home. Never had the expression been more bitter. Normally, Raven would have been able to easily deal with such a threat…

Except it was her fault. She'd failed this woman, time and time again, most recently by going to battle the Lord to as much slake a grudge than to stop him. Now she was too late; her empathy powers couldn't help here, and the situation was too dire for her to spend time jury-rigging a substitute. Nor could she just ignore the girl; she'd probably immediately go after someone else, something that would probably put her at more risk than her target.

"Often seen a cat…without a grin…"

The blade crashed against Raven's shield. Again. And again. Nothing she could do. As helpless to save her as Marissa was to stop.

Raven ignored that looming reality. She'd had a lot of practice in that.

"Marissa! It's me! It's Raven! I can help you! Come back!" Raven said. Sometimes the most obvious solution was best, but Raven's voice didn't seem to register…

"Raven!"

Robin intercepted Marissa's next blow at the wrist, shifting her momentum and shoving her backwards, Marissa tripping and falling onto her side.

"Marissa." Robin said.

"Off with…her head…" Marissa said, pushing herself back up.

"Raven, fight the Abhorred. I'll deal with this." Robin said.

"Robin…she's in a complete fugue. On autopilot. Likely unreachable." Raven said, but her tone was informal. She'd been given an order and she had absolute faith in her leader.

"Got it. I'll take care of it."

"Please. Just…help her." Raven said, and flew away. Marissa immediately tried to give chase, Robin cutting her off.

"Marissa…you're alive. Whatever happened, I'm sorry, WE CAN STILL _HELP_-"

"It doesn't matter which way you go…" Marissa said, the shifting blade scything out. Robin closed to block and then immediately retreated. Suddenly, the process of fighting an ever-stronger mass of shadow seemed preferable.

* * *

The flash of green briefly split the agonized clouds roiling above La Voix; human vision would have barely been able to follow the black streak before it crashed into the side of the still-raging volcano. Chunks of rock rained down, the air filled with choking ash, though the Lord did not need to breath and hence ignored that fact. The heat in the air and the ground was nothing compared to the heat in his chest, green wisps of energy sizzling as they rose from the writhing shadow; if the Lord still had a heart, it would have felt like he'd just flown past tachycardia and was plunging headlong into arrest.

Pain. The Lord could live with pain. He'd kept it for the same reason human beings had it; it told you something was wrong. The Lord's evolution and ascension gave him a lot more options for these signals than most anyone on this realm and others could muster, but none of them were working. The signals, the pain, were telling the Lord that he might as well be back to organic flesh that had just had a fresh, up-close meeting with a bullet. They were speaking beyond the fact that he was losing, taking far more damage than he was dishing out.

He was at risk of falling apart completely. Except this time, the card up his sleeve wasn't playing so well, to coin a phrase.

Neither would the alien relinquish her stranglehold on the game, her energies carving a line across the black air towards the Lord. The Lord, however, hadn't quite run out of moves yet.

Hitting the alien was doing nothing. So the Lord backhanded the volcano instead, his form vanishing as a massive crack opened in its side, more choking ash and burning volcanic miasma exploding from within the tortured mountain, engulfing both him and the Titan before she could arrest her forward momentum. The alien's body could handle intense heat and oxygen deprivation to a degree that Kryptonians would envy, but even Starfire in her supercharged state couldn't just ignore it, especially when she was caught off guard. The Lord, on the other hand, not only did so but exited the cloud within a second, targeting Starfire inside the dark mass and firing off an electrical-based strike. It hit dead center, the alien's muscles going into spasms from the offensive voltage, and the Lord flew further backwards, holding up his arms as a rainbow of destructive blasts appeared above him.

They exploded not on Starfire, but in the air above the Lord as the alien lashed out, her eyes beams flashing across each attack and detonating it before the Lord could even aim, the force driving the Lord backwards. Impossible! She couldn't, even with, she'd just taken a cloud of burning ash to the face …even SHE couldn't-!

Starfire didn't care for the Lord's assessment any more than all his previous ones, and within another second she was back within striking distance. The Lord ducked under her first roundhouse strike; before he could do anything else Starfire's other fist sank into his torso and nearly ripped right through him. Stumbling back, the Lord lashed out with bladed tendrils, their points burning up before they could touch the alien, the Titan advancing on him once more. The Lord tripled his efforts, tendrils of darkness ripping out of the ground to stab and grasp at his enemy, the shadow god snarling as his power kept burning away, but the greater quality, after a few seconds, seemed to get SOME result, the clutching filaments grapping onto Starfire's arms faster than her aura could destroy them. Starfire paused a moment, glancing down at her wrists.

The Lord struck, his arm flashing into a blade that he aimed right for Starfire's torso.

The alien's kick flashed all the faster, breaking the sword off at the 'hilt' and sending the Lord reeling back, foul black mist erupting from the stump Starfire'd made. The alien ripped her way free of the tendrils, her hands shooting out and grasping for the Lord's head. More lines of shadow erupted from the Lord's body, grabbing at the alien's arms and frantically trying to keep them away, the Lord's body smoking from Starfire's close presence even as he somehow pulled her arms further away from him.

Starfire promptly smashed her face into the Lord's own, her skull driving into the Lord's shadow body before she opened her eyes, the Lord's face disintegrating beneath the alien's wrathful gaze. This time, Starfire reacted before the Lord could recover from his backwards stagger, slamming her hands together and blasting the Lord so hard she nearly lost her balance, the green blast enveloping the Lord before it flew across La Voix's tortured surface and detonated in the ocean waters beyond with the force of a bunker buster.

The Lord, however, had not gone with the blast, his ravaged form remaining where he had been, holes forming and closing in the darkness that emitted keening, ear-paining shrieks. Starfire looked at the reforming mass for a few seconds before she blazed forward again, her right hand engulfing itself in emerald power she planned to shove directly into the Lord's center of being before she exploded it from within…

"_**ENOUGH!"**_

The Lord's face reformed when Starfire was a step from him, his eyes piercing into her own. Despite all her power, Starfire found herself freezing, and then the ground falling away beneath her, as the world retreated to a mental void.

It was not, however, a state Starfire was wholly unfamiliar with.

"…_if you believe you can warp me like you did Noel, you are incorrect. Even __**if **__I was not your anathema, I have trained and shared with Raven perhaps even more than Noel did, and unlike him, I know exactly what you are doing. You will fail, monster. As you do in everything."_

"_**You think this is all over but the shouting, Koriand'r of Tamaran? That you'll pave over the wounds and holes in your family in righteous blood? You think you're saving the world?**_

"_I know I am."_

"_**Ah, you know. How LITTLE you UNDERSTAND.**_

"_**Do you remember the word, Koriand'r? Troq? Do you remember why that word exists outside your language? You should recall your planet's history, Koriand'r. Your race. Peaceful. Kind. Loving. Never raising a hand unless provoked. You know how the other races of the universe saw such a viewpoint, Koriand'r. They saw it as weakness. They saw it as an invitation to invade and conquer you, to take your planet's resources and your people as slaves or worse. And of how they found, again and again, what strength was behind your supposed weakness. How well your strong emotions could turn to defiance, and ferocity, and rage. How strong they made you. And so your invaders were routed, time after time, thrown back into space broken and scarred. But did they learn, Koriand'r? Did they understand?**_

"_**Of course not. They hated instead. Seethed and hated and did everything they could to shift the blame off their own selves. That's why the term 'troq' exists, Koriand'r. A legacy of hatred and jealous delusion, all born by the fact that all you did was be yourself and defend yourselves. But that didn't matter. It didn't matter that your people were anything but 'nothing'; they wanted to hate and disdain the people they thought they could easily bring under their thumb. The people who bit off their hand instead. It's astonishing what fertile soil a desperate need to lie is, is it not?"**_

"_That has nothing to do with me."_

"_**IT HAS EVERYTHING TO DO WITH YOU! Even your own PEOPLE were not immune! Your sister ended up your mortal enemy because of it!"**_

"…_Komand'r made her own choices."_

"_**Did she? Did she chose to be born on a day the Citadel launched its latest attack, proclaiming the damage it did before it was beaten back in her name? Did she chose to be born to a species that didn't understand subtle emotions well, that tried and failed not to link her with that horror, who smiled to her face and tried to mean it, but deep down inside, just couldn't shake that innate urge to blame something for their pain once such a choice was offered? The Titans speak so highly of your race's purity…do they ever think of the downside of a race that doesn't understand non-absolutes well? If they'd just told her to her face why she prompted faint anger and resentment, when she was old enough to understand…maybe she would have been able to bear it. Maybe with all your kind's virtues, she'd have made peace with it. Yet your kind didn't. So Komand'r left Tamaran to travel the universe and try to understand her place, as it didn't seem to be among her own kind. Only to find that the universe itself seemed to reject her as well. You know full well the rest, Koriand'r. You know how your own inability to understand this made your sister's actions hurt all the more. That's what they DO, Titan. The ones who will destroy you, the ones I will, MUST exterminate. They never come at you from the front. They always, ALWAYS, stab you in the back."**_

"…"

"_**Your family will never be the issue. This world will. That you protect in turn by protecting them. It will cheer and chant your name, and then one day you'll wake up to find it stuffing a rag down your mouth before it carries you AND your family off to slavery again. Or worse. They will betray you, Koriand'r. They won't do it for the reasons you claim I wave like a flag. They'll do it for reasons you can't even begin to understand and prepare for, and they'll smile as you, their hero, who sacrificed so much for them, are carried away to suit their needs, their ends. Just like the beings that turned troq into an insult. Just like your sister. Just like the species that crawls on this planet sucking blood until there's nothing left to drain. You KNOW this, Starfire. You have done so much to understand…yet you understand NOTHING. You can't. It's not who you are. Who you are will DAMN you, your family, this world.**_

"_**Tell me I'm lying, Koriand'r. Because if I am, your entire reason for being who you are is a lie too."**_

The world faded back into focus. Starfire stood where she had been, as did the Lord, though the fact that he had reformed some more indicated that a little time had passed. The clouds crackled and roared overhead, the rain of ash and pebbles continuing to fall down onto La Voix's surface.

"What is great in man is that he is a bridge and not a goal." The Lord said. "Thus spake Zar-"

The Lord didn't get any further, as Starfire's hand seized him by the throat.

"I _know _what you are." Starfire said, her quiet voice commanding more power than even the thunder above. "You can batter me with complicated greys and semi-understandable morality all you wish. I don't care. You made yourself my enemy. You hurt my _family_. There is absolutely nothing you can say or do that will stave off your fate, BECAUSE YOU WROTE IT AS SURELY AS YOU SEEK THE DESTINY OF THIS WORLD." Starfire said, and hurled the Lord through the nearest cliff face. A pair of Starbolts collapsed it onto him.

"Your words mean NOTHING to me. And soon you will BE nothing."

The Lord's bellow of rage somehow drowned out the storm and the volcano, the rock around him exploding into pieces which were then burned to ash, the shockwave and wind sweeping back Starfire's hair as she remained where she was.

"_**NEVER."**_ The Lord said, his voice piercing into Starfire's ears. She gave no response, even as he manifested twice as many black orbs as before, dark sparks spitting from their spherical bodies as the Lord hurled them, the attacks converging on Starfire and consuming her, her form vanishing in the blast.

Said form returned to the sky, vanishing again as the Lord appeared with her, slashing through the empty air before Starfire lanced back down and kicked the Lord back towards La Voix, the Lord clipping the edge of a cliff before slamming into the ground and carving a new line into it. Shadow flowed back up before Starfire hit the ground and shot across it like a missile, her fist slamming into the Lord's body and shoving him a mile within two seconds before she smashed him into another cliff. The Lord tried to flee from Starfire's agonizing touch, but the alien's speed remained Flash-esque as she seized the Lord's form and swung him over her head, smashing him into the ground before she fired into his body at point-blank range, the impact and the Lord's subsequent trip through the earth cracking open the ground of La Voix and hewing open a deep fissure that hit the ocean and kept going, the salt water pouring into the newly opened chasm in a roiling mass.

The Lord rose up from the water, lightning striking the waves behind him as he stopped, mist roiling off his body and his eyes blazing with fury.

"Never?" Starfire said.

"_**DIIIEEEEEEE!" **_The Lord roared, throwing his hands up and out, a blast of destroying dark power the size of a truck flying at Starfire. Starfire cocked her head, and then her own eyes blazed as she flew forward.

Directly into the blast, the attack engulfing her and not slowing her down one bit. No sooner had the Lord realized how ineffective the strike was before Starfire struck back, her fist erupting from the blast and slamming into the Lord's face. Another strike smashed the Lord's features' like glass, and the final axe-handle strike sent the Lord streaking across La Voix before destroying another cliff face with his landing. Idly, Starfire wondered how the whole island hadn't been rendered as flat as a pancake from the unending destruction of terrain that had occurred ever since the Titans had landed, but geology had never been her strong suit.

The thought made Starfire's eyes flick to Etemenanki. Her friends. Something had happened, otherwise they would have been out here to support her, if just in spirit. They'd been hurt, she had been able to tell even from the brief glance she'd taken in before she'd turned her attention fully to the Lord. Maybe..

No. The Lord was her duty. If she could destroy him, once and for all, every other issue would cease to be a problem. Her friends could handle themselves, even at their lowest. Her task was to bring the Lord so low he never could rise to threaten her and hers again.

He wasn't going to make it easy either, even now, as he erupted from his latest destructive landing, going straight for Starfire.

Starfire met him with a fist, and the sky exploded in a thunder that drowned out nature's own.

* * *

A similar clash of strength mirrored the one in the sky, but not in the preferable way, as Savior met the Abhorred and was hurled backwards by their clash of strength, the Titan flipping over and trying to land on his feet, only to trip from the backwards grind and nearly fall ass over elbows backwards before the Shimmer balanced him. Raven swooped in, but the Abhorred teleported away, the Titan's power exploding worthlessly against the floor.

"This isn't working, Raven." Savior said, wiping blood and sweat from his face.

"We can't give up."

"Give up? No." Savior said, before the echo of another explosion outside rattled the tower. "Damn…I really hope that was Kory."

"Probably. Ricky's explosions tend to be sort of WRAAAAKRACKA, Star's blasts are sort of OOOMMMMM." Metatron said, before he gestured to Raven and the pair fired a simultaneous gold and black strike at the Abhorred as he tried to drain power from the rift again, driving it away. "You're right though, we could be doing better."

"Better, nothing. It's like fighting steam!" Beast Boy said, settling on Raven's shoulder as a sparrow. Metatron gave the changeling a brief glance. "Oh, you know what I mean!"

"Come on Gar." Savior said, Beast Boy transforming into a horse that Noel leapt onto, forming a Shimmer lance as they raced towards the Abhorred.

"THE THOROUGHBRED OF SIN!" Metatron yelped, hiding behind Raven. The empathy's eyes widened; had that been a moment of brief, genuine panic?

"What?"

"Nothing. What's Ricky plotting, Raven?" Metatron said, back beside her as Savior and Beast Boy clashed with the Abhorred.

"He's fighting Star."

"Yes. What ELSE? You know him."

"I do…he's doing badly, but in our current state, so are we." Raven said, turning over Metatron's words. The Lord had pulled last minute tricks before, she had to assume even now he'd be doing the same. What could he do…

A possibility occurred to her, Raven drawing runes in the air that fired out across the walls, sinking into them.

"There, that will keep him from teleporting in or transferring his mind into the Abhorred…for three or four seconds." Raven said. She'd lacked the strength to make anything more potent. "Kory will need to be faster than-"

Raven cut herself off, she and Metatron blurring away to avoid a blast. Chunks of rock flew from the impact point of the blast, one streaking across the room, Robin's honed senses causing him to instinctively duck.

The rock piece struck Marissa instead. Struck being the literal term, as a black shield manifested half a second before the rock hit her, completely negating not only the impact, but the momentum, the rock shard falling limply to the ground. Robin wasn't sure what worried him more; the fact that the shield hadn't appeared when he'd blocked her strikes, or the fact that Marissa hadn't even noticed her close call.

"Marissa-"

Robin dodged backwards from Marissa's slash, then immediately planted his feet and jerked his left foot up to deflect Marissa's stomping kick. She'd been going for his knee, and no sooner had he blocked that then she went for his leg, Robin jerking away before she could rip into the battered armor. Still no shield there.

"Marissa! All you wanted was help! This won't help! You, me, anyone!"

"What is the use…" Marissa said, moving her other hand over her arm blade, tiny sparkling diamond like microbots flying up and injecting electricity into the mercurial metal, Marissa lancing it out and stabbing for Robin's throat like a spear. Robin dodge-rolled to the side, a lance of pain shooting up his back as he did so. He could fight hurt, he could fight exhausted, he'd been trained in both artificial and actual situations for such things, he could even fight like that against a foe with superior equipment…but fighting under both while being unable to really fight back? Even he might have been out of his league.

It didn't matter. He'd do it anyway. Hell, he had yet to learn any sense about where it was impossible to win, why start now? It was a Titan thing.

"How I wonder…" Marissa said, and lashed out with her arm. Robin jerked his head to the side as the end of the liquid metal weapon broke off and turned into an abrupt throwing knife, slicing open his cheek before Robin ducked under another scything blow and diving away. His eyes narrowed as the piece of expelled metal rolled back along the ground and floated back up to rejoin Marissa's blade, the girl taking a few seconds to turn around before she resumed attacking.

Scalpel's makeshift rope-blade crashed down into the ground in front of her.

"I must ask that you stop being so rude." The alien said.

"Speak roughly…" Marissa said, and stabbed the liquid metal towards the alien instead. He dodged around it, snapping his palm out and flooring Marissa, the blow sending the girl tumbling across the floor.

"Scalpel, no! I'm handling this!" Robin said. The alien had pulled his punch, Robin could tell, but that might not have been enough, especially since Robin hadn't seen the flash of black that had stopped the rock.

"Robin?"

"The Abhorred! Stop the Abhorred! I can handle this myself!"

"Roger." Scalpel said, and turned back towards the main battle, running a few steps…

Before he leapt back towards Marissa, who was getting back up. The liquid metal blade lashed out, but the alien was even more fluid, spinning around and grabbing onto Marissa's left arm, raking his claw across the mechanisms there before leaping back, a shower of sparks erupting from the device before the liquid metal lost its animation and sloshed down onto the ground.

"Done now." Scalpel said, and ran off. Marissa stared down at her broken weapon, her unfocussed eyes seemingly processing the change but remaining unaffected by it.

"Marissa! See? We could have killed you right there, hurt you, we're on your side-!" Robin said.

"Almost certain to disagree…" Marissa said, before she sprinted back towards Robin, drawing a short blade from her back. "Off with her head-"

"No." Robin said, and resumed his dodging dance.

The Abhorred did not do likewise when Scalpel leapt, the alien ramming both blades into the entity's back. A moment later both blades were expelled with such force that Scalpel nearly hit the ceiling. Savior promptly rammed a whipping Shimmer blade into the creature's neck and got the same result, the Abhorred grabbing the Shimmer and yanking Savior forward. Savior was saved from taking a shadow-axe to the face by a dark portal manifesting between the two, Savior flying into it and yanking the Shimmer free before the Abhorred could yank on it again, landing next to Raven.

"This isn't WORKING." Savior growled, while Beast Boy attacked the Abhorred as a gorilla armed with Gauntlet-wrapped fists and arms. The Abhorred teleported behind the two and blasted them across the room, Savior Shimmer-grabbing both to stop from crashing into the wall while Scalpel swooped in to attack again. "We need to do something else!"

"I've sealed the room. The Lord can't get in or out, nor can it…briefly. Very briefly." Raven said.

"What about the girl?" Savior said.

"I don't think she can affect anything…intentional or not. I'd know more if-"

"We weren't exhausted. We are, deal with it."

"Back from the dead for five minutes and already giving orders. Yep, you're Noel all right." Gauntlet said, spitting bloody saliva out of his mouth as he got up.

"You have any ideas Rob?" Savior said.

"…Actually I do."

"Do it! Beast Boy, Raven, with me again!" Savior said, and ran off to help Scalpel. Gauntlet, on the other hand, went directly for the Foreverwhere rift.

"…Gauntlet no! Don't try to tap it! You don't know what you're doing!" Raven yelled.

"Not tapping it! Just…!" Gauntlet said, as his yellow power flowed out and into the edge of the rift, sealing it like caulk. "PLUGGING it! Now keep it off me!"

"…Might work." Raven said, and then her eyes jerked back to the battle as an explosion drove the three attacking Titans away. Raven flew towards the Abhorred, trying to keep Gauntlet covered.

The Abhorred just teleported away, re-appearing near Gauntlet. Gauntlet jerked back, but instead of attacking, the Abhorred just held out its hands, white power phasing through Gauntlet's energy plug and into it. Raven cursed low under her breath.

"Gauntlet, it's not working! It can pull power through yours, like the ROCK!" Raven yelled, and blasted the Abhorred in the gut, knocking it back.

"…Oh just…that's just blatant cheating." Gauntlet said. The Abhorred reformed on its feet…

Then the cloak dropped down over it.

"SO IS THIS!" Morgue said, the heavy armored material yanked down by Shimmer lines and wrapped around the Abhorred's ankles. The entity stumbled around, clearly confused, before parts of the cloak began to bulge outward, the creature trying to get free.

"CLOAK'S ARMORED! CUT RESISTANT! HAMMER IT!" Sophie yelled, running back to her unfinished building task.

"Don't need to tell me twice!" Gauntlet yelled, ripping out and smashing another chunk of rock into the thrashing form. Beast Boy followed it up by ramming into it as a pachycephalosaurus, knocking the struggling form backwards, its efforts increasing all the more as it tried to get free.

"Dude, that worked? How did a cloak work?" Beast Boy said.

"Abhorred aren't that smart. Not good at problem solving." Metatron said, popping up once again seemingly from nothing. "It was probably told to drain power and don't let the Titans stop it. Against a inanimate cloak? Too literal. Gets confused, doesn't do something smart like teleport or phase. Won't last forever though. What are we missing, Raven?"

"You don't know? You're not being cute?" Raven said, as Savior risked picking the wrapped Abhorred up and bashing it against the floor.

"Not the time." Metatron said. So he was being serious, trying to see if anything that occurred to Raven jarred something in his own head. Raven took two seconds to smash the wrapped Abhorred with some blunt black-energy strikes of her own, thinking all the while.

"Room's sealed! Marissa's not part of it! Star's on fire!" Raven said, thinking out loud.

"Oh, I get it!"

"Not now Adam. Star will keep him away from the room and the depths…I don't think he has any other tricks-"

"Hold that thought." Metatron said, leaping in and kicking the Abhorred with both feet. "Ack! NOEL, LET GO! JUST DO IT!"

Savior listened, snapping back the shimmer before the cloak disintegrated in an eruption of power that hammered the attacking Titans backwards.

Robin had heard the 'wind-up' noise of the blast and braced himself; Marissa did not, and was knocked flat on her back from the shockwave. Robin immediately assessed three ways to end the fight and dismissed them immediately; all of them would involve hurting her. He also noted the lack of the 'black defence'; it hadn't protected her from Scalpel's claw attack either…

Time for the final test. Robin picked up a chunk of rock and tossed it underhand, the stone tumbling down.

The black shield flash happened as it bounced off Marissa's stomach. That settled it. It was a defence against the Lord's own power, probably to protect her from the collateral damage of the fight. The tower had been forged by the Lord, ergo its pieces couldn't hurt her, it even covered her surviving the explosion and fall…

Not, however, when it mattered. When it counted. The Lord had failed her there. If he'd even wanted to succeed.

Could Robin?

"Marissa…you can hear me, I know you can, you did before. This won't change, in BOTH ways. We can stop this, I can keep my promise…but I can't do it alone. You have to STAND…"

"Now our tale is done…" Marissa said, her tone as dead as before. "Everything's got a moral, if only you can find it…"

The sword stabbed for Robin's head, and even as he dodged his heart grew cold, intertwining with his nerves. He'd avoided it long enough. Decision time. Was this _Alice in Wonderland_, where Alice woke up to the real world at the end? Or was this another story…like _Old Yeller._

Or _Lord of the Flies._

"Damn it. That used up some power but not enough. Now we're back to the drawing board." Raven said as she floated up. Her team-mates had regained her feet faster, Beast Boy as a hippopotamus and Scalpel running in to attack the Abhorred again.

"Raven, can you access the Foreverwhere again?" Gauntlet said.

"If I could I would have…no. I'd need several minutes at least to re-establish what the Lord broke, minutes we don't have…"

"Grruuhhh…when this is over I'm going to beat the crap out of whoever created minutes!"

"The ancient Egyptians?" Savior said.

"OF COURSE YOU'D KNOW THAT!" Gauntlet yelled, ripping out another piece of the floor and moving to attack again. "HEY YOU! YOU STILL RESEMBLE A NAIL!"

The Abhorred responded with an explosive blast, the Titans scattering and Raven throwing up a shield that barely deflected the debris from her person.

"What about me?" Metatron said, beside her. "The Foreverwhere."

"…No Adam. Your nature's too chaotic. You could do horrific damage…it's all about intent and I can't calculate the risk/rew-" Raven said, before the movement caught her eye.

Savior was charging directly at the Foreverwhere.

"NOEL, WHAT ARE YOU DOING!?"

"CALCULATED RISK!" Savior yelled, throwing back an arm as the Shimmer flowed out into a crude key like shape.

"NOEL, DON'T!"

The edge of the Shimmer construct raked across the rift before Metatron tackled his fellow Titan. Raven let out a wordless yell as the fissure let out a whip-like crack, white energy briefly exploding out and zapping through Savior like an electrical bolt before fragmenting off his body and flying through the air of the room, Savior letting out his own surprised, agonized yelp as it did so. Raven felt her love's vital systems briefly spike and then slam back down to normal, Metatron flipping off him to his feet as Savior crashed down to the ground.

"Normally I'd let you take the risk. That's what I'd do. Raven, though, sounded like she thought it was a bad idea." Metatron said, looking down at Savior, smoke pouring off his scorched clothing and hair. "Looks like she was right."

"What the hell just happened?" Gauntlet yelled from where he, Scalpel, and Beast Boy were futilely trying to hold the Abhorred back.

"Noel just nearly blew his head up trying to tap the Foreverwhere! Oh, congratulations!" Metatron said.

"Huh?" Savior mumbled.

"That's exactly what I would do." Met nods. "NOW you're thinking with Portals."

Savior said nothing, the Shimmer pushing him to his feet. Raven flew over to do a one-second check of her boyfriend, then looked into his eyes as they cleared.

"Don't do that again." Raven said, and flew back into battle.

"That portal. Over there." Metatron said, pointing at the rift.

"Shut up Met." Savior said.

"I hate to dump on anything that gives me ammo for my next argument where Noel questions my intelligen-" Gauntlet got out before the Abhorred blurred over and kicked him across the room. "OW! MY JEJUNUM!"

Tendrils seized Beast Boy and Scalpel, smashing them together and throwing them into Raven, knocking them all down as the Abhorred went for the rift again.

"As I was saying, ow my ileum…possibly my duodenum…why did I watch that _ER _marathon…" Gauntlet groaned as he got back up. "Did that actually DO anything?"

The sonic blast struck the Abhorred, driving it across the whole room and smashing it against the wall.

"Distinctly possible." Cyborg said, and fired again, blasting the Abhorred through the wall completely.

* * *

Explosions.

Her life was explosions, Starfire realized. Changes never just entered her life: they exploded into it, ever since she'd had anything resembling a hand over it. Fire, heat, pressure, debris, all part of explosions, all signifiers of her choice of life. And now, in the greatest battle of her life…

Explosions. Again, and again, and again, and now again, as she flew alongside the Lord, the shadow god firing at her in his latest futile effort, each blast missing and giving La Voix yet another wound. Starfire wondered if her enemy would end up sinking his own island in the end, and concluded she still didn't care. Moving at what felt like the speed of light, she zapped over to the Lord, her fist ripping more shadow from his form as she knocked him into the air, Starfire following with another pile-driving jab that sent the Lord crashing and dragging across half a mile of the island. Starfire settled back down, looking at her enemy as he tried to piece himself back together. Incredibly, he laughed.

"You can't kill me…"

"You have a very different idea of what's happening." Starfire said.

"_**YOU CAN'T KILL ME! **_The Justice League couldn't kill me, the Shadowpact couldn't kill me, your strongest teammate at her best and worst, Skye and Joshua, Necron's spawn, the Primmortal, every last one of you CHILDREN, NONE of them could kill me and YOU can't kill me!" The Lord said, red mist streaming out of his body along with the black as he pushed himself up. "He who denies his own vanity usually possesses it in so brutal a form that he instinctively shuts his eyes to avoid the necessity of despising himself."

"…Are you talking about me? Or yourself?"

"…it doesn't matter. I'm linked to what you refuse to destroy. Light…all light…ir eventually goes out. The darkness always remains. You can't kill the Night."

"_I _can."

"With what? Anger, vengeance, hate? Those are my domains, Koriand'r of Tamaran. What then? Love? If you really knew the task of love, you wouldn't be here. Love is a state in which a man sees things most decidedly as they are not." The Lord said. "I am…as eternal…as the blackness that surrounds your kind. Your essence. Your light."

"I don't believe you."

"Believe…all you wish. If you desire peace of soul and happiness, then believe; if you would be a disciple of truth…"

The Lord trailed off, even as Starfire's stance changed, ever so slightly.

"…what just happened?" The Lord said. He'd sensed…SOMETHING…

Starfire responded by punching him so hard the blow shattered the ground beneath her, the Lord finally coming to a stop a hundred meters away.

"No…this is not possible…" The Lord said. The alien's attitude had changed completely, what in damnation-!

Starfire's blow came out of nowhere, smashing the Lord into the ground.

"I decline to continue this conversation." Starfire said. "You say you can't die, I say I can kill you. The only difference is whether I WILL kill you. Look at me and tell ME I'm wrong."

"You…can't…"

"Wrong." Starfire said, and vaporized the Lord's face from the neck up with blasts from her eyes. "Die."

The Lord thrust out an arm, only for Starfire to grab it and rip it off, black miasma gouting from his main body. Emerald destruction erupted from Starfire's hands, consuming the limb entirely, and no sooner had the Lord regrown a face then Starfire put her fist through it again, slamming her other fist into the Lord's torso and blasting him in half with another point-blank Starbolt.

The top half of the Lord crashed back to earth twenty feet away, his mind aboil. What had happened? The alien had been trying to kill him before, yes, but she'd also been trying to punish him, just like Raven. Unlike Raven, a switch had been pulled out of nowhere; Starfire was now proceeding with the intent to properly, completely atomize every last scrap of the Lord's sentient dark essence into absolute nothingness. The worst part was, in power and will, _she was fully capable of doing it. _She'd just needed to decide to.

She had. Somehow, the need had punched through her basic nature and taken the controls. The Lord couldn't delay any longer; he had to turn this around…

The explosion might have finished his annihilation had the Lord not teleported away. Desperately trying to mask his presence, the Lord flew towards Etemenanki, reaching out to summon his Abhorred…

He realized the barrier was there half a second before he crashed into it.

"You-" The Lord said, realizing what Raven had done.

Starfire's backhand sent the Lord nearly all the way to the beach, the Lord's body lying there, unable to move for a few seconds. No, he'd come so far, he'd gone through so much, it wasn't over yet, he refused to let it-!

Starfire's hands smashed down on the Lord's form, glowing bright. A hundred square feet of sand fused in glass from the explosion, but the Lord was not part of it, having teleported away again.

This time, Starfire found him before he could move. This time, she just whipped a Starbolt into his ravaged body, the smoking form slamming back down to the ground.

"This is impossible…you can't kill me…"

"I've done a lot of impossible things since I was shown those who you claim will destroy me." Starfire said. "This will just be the latest. DIE."

The storm of Starbolts devastated the island with rocking explosions that covered two square miles. Three miles distant, the Lord re-appeared.

A second later, Starfire floated five feet from him.

"Die." Starfire said, and hurled another Starbolt.

The Lord shattered, but not under the impact of the attack. Instead, he split into two, the energy flying through the space he had once been in, as his body split again and again. Starfire's eyes narrowed at the trick, before several of the shadows attacked her, more flanking her even as other ones fled.

Power exploded from her, the false Lords vanishing like popped balloons, not even leaving a trace. Starfire tested out this fact further by punching one of the shades using nothing but her bare hand, only for it to shatter into oblivion as well.

"If you wish to die by inches, then SO BE IT." Starfire growled, her eyes lighting up before the energy burst from her eyes, wider and fiercer than it had ever been, sweeping across the landscape and consuming everything the alien could see.

* * *

The Lord hadn't been the only affected when he'd crashed into Raven's barrier, cutting him off from his Abhorred. The impact had rippled through the inner chamber, shaking the floor and drawing the attention of several of the Titans.

It also drew Marissa's attention, her face clouding with confusion.

"…Master?"

Robin struck, dashing in and grasping Marissa's wrist, twisting it and causing her to lose her grip on her sword. Marissa clawed for Robin's eyes, the Titan seizing her other wrist and grappling with her. All the while, her eyes remained glazed, a thousand miles away, even lacking the focus of concentration. It didn't affect her efforts as she kicked at Robin's knees and ankles and did her best to break free or shift the momentum.

"What was that?" Gauntlet said, looking at the hole leading outside, the Lord having been knocked away before he could see him.

"Ricky's in a bad way." Metatron said. "Raven, how many more blows can that barrier take?"

"…none." Raven said. "And I don't think I can recreate it."

"All right then. HEY CYBORG! DON'T LET RICKY'S DANDRUFF OUT!"

"What?"

The Abhorred burst forth from the hole Cyborg had blasted it through, sprinting directly towards the newly revived Titan.

"Get that thing!" Savior clarified.

"Oh. Of course." Cyborg said, and promptly clotheslined the Abhorred when it tried to rip him apart, before thrusting up his foot and letting the creature have it with a blast from the backup sonic cannon he had there. The Abhorred twirled back to its feet, only to take another sonic cannon blast to the face. To Cyborg, it felt better than the last five great things he'd done put together. With the jolt of power Savior had inadvertently given his systems, Cyborg planned to make sure he would be VERY happy within the next minute.

"That's right you bastard. I had to sit there and watch you beat up my friends, but no more. Time for you to crawl back into…"

Cyborg's eye would have been almost comical in a less severe situation, as he took one large step to prepare to charge and abruptly went down to one knee, his illuminated blue parts fading to a dull grey. The Titans stared in disbelief.

"…oh crud. I think I forgot to carry a one somewhere." Cyborg said. So much for his ode to joy: now a better song for him would be _Lump_.

"Oh hell! VIC!" Beast Boy yelled, racing to help his friend. The Abhorred was quicker, and proceeded to ignore the Titan entirely, zapping around him and devouring power from the rift once more. When Beast Boy changed direction and tried to ram him as a goat again, the Abhorred knocked him aside with a casual backhand.

"Noel, next time you accidentally charge up a cyborg in a life or death situation, do it better. This is very inconvenient." Metatron said.

"Doesn't matter! Cyborg's down again, DON'T LET IT OUT!" Savior yelled, throwing himself forward. "GIVE IT EVERYTHING YOU HAVE!"

"Noel, the last time you told me that we nearly got arrested." Metatron said, and sprinted off in another direction. Raven and Scalpel charged in as well, only for the Abhorred to leap into the air and slam down, a plus-sign of energy shooting out and blasting all four of them away. "Ow. So, again, what am we forgetting?"

A golden beam flew past the Abhorred, causing it to recoil in shock. None of the Titans had been able to bring solar energy to bear. Until.

"ME." Morgue said, stepping up with her finally repaired weapon, having hacked her rifle and Noel's gun together in a Frankenfirearm. "Don't worry, I saved the best for last!"

The Shimmer and Raven's power lashed out, seizing onto the Abhorred before it could recover.

"GET IT SOPHIE!" Scalpel yelled. Sophie braced the hybrid rifle, activated its battery once more, aimed, and fired.

The gun promptly…did nothing.

"…is it supposed to be invisible this time?" Metatron said.

"No! It's not…jammed! Damn it!" Sophie yelled, pulling the weapon down and trying to fix it. "It's not working!"

"Worse, Morgue! It's overloading!" Cyborg yelled.

"CRAP! CRAP CRAP!" Morgue yelled, even as the Abhorred tossed Savior and Raven off it like they were trying to hold it down with newspaper. "What do I do? What do I do?"

"What comes to mind?" Metatron said. Morgue paused a second, and then tossed the overloading weapon directly into the Abhorred's arms. The Abhorred stopped dead, looking at the device like it didn't know what to make of it.

"Works for me." Metatron said, and ducked down as the hacked-together weapon suffered a critical failure and exploded in a blast of solar energy, consuming the Abhorred and lighting up the whole room with blinding light.

Marissa instinctively recoiled from the flash, and Robin immediately spun around her, releasing her wrist and grabbing it from behind the woman, yanking her arms behind her and pinning them against her spine. He'd decided.

"I'm sorry." Robin said.

There was no gentle way to give someone a concussion, but Robin did his damndest, as he struck the insane girl in the back of her skull, Marissa shuddering and going limp, Robin keeping her from collapsing as he turned his eyes back towards the battle.

Morgue sat up, wishing she'd stopped for a moment to put her mask back on before she'd tried to shoot her gun. Batman-designed lenses were really useful in these times.

"…Well, it worked, I guess."

"Didn't know what to do when its enemy gave it a weapon. Nice job. Ricky really should have invested in the premium design." Metatron said, Morgue trying to blink the spots out of her eyes.

The Abhorred surged back up once all the light was gone, ripped open and leaking the same black mist its maker emitted, the Titans goggling at the sight. There was one crucial difference however; the Abhorred was standing right next to the Foreverwhere rift, and it immediately turned and began draining power like nothing had happened. Within a second it was intact; within three it was glowing.

"FUCCCCCKKKKKK!" Savior yelled, sending the Shimmer lancing out in a spear. The Abhorred contorted around it, and then for the first time, it turned away from the rift.

Looking directly at the hole outside. Raven's face went pale.

"Robin, Savior!" Raven said.

"I KNOW! DO NOT LET IT OUT!" Savior yelled back.

"Rargh! Why is everything an uphill struggle? Why can't we ever get the easy ones?" Morgue cursed, fumbling for a weapon before she realized she was completely, utterly out. The realization settled on her: she'd played all her hands and come up with no pot. And now everything was going to pot.

"Sophie's sad. Guess now's the time to try and do this again." Metatron said, and sprinted towards the Abhorred, only to take a lashing tendril to the chest that knocked him across the room and into Savior. "This could be bad!"

Raven flew in next, throwing up shields of dark energy the Abhorred smashed through like candy glass. A bladed arm blocked Scalpel's weapon attack, and when the alien tried to grapple the Abhorred he ended up running through him, a kick knocking him away. Morgue and Cyborg watched helplessly, out of weapons and power, and Robin leapt in, silent as a ghost, only to be seized and smashed into the ground. Beast Boy, going for desperate measures, transformed into a T-Rex and tried to bite into the Abhorred, only to get seized by the jaw and flipped over like he weighed as much as a stick dinosaur skeleton. In the grip of her own desperation, Raven flew forward, trying to find the strength for another spell…

The fear hit her like a sledgehammer. Mortal, overwhelming fear, out of nowhere, stopping her cold as it stabbed into her mind. On its heels came realization; it wasn't an attack. The Abhorred hadn't done it, and it wasn't from her friends, it wasn't her, yet the fear had frozen her…

Letting the Abhorred had reached the hole.

"No."

Before the rocky wall contorted and crushed itself shut, trapping the Abhorred inside.

"Yeah." Terra said, golden light dancing across her corneas as she stood with her right hand out. "Hey long0tailed cat. You're in a room full of rocking chairs."

A tornado of jagged stone ripped up from the floor and consumed the Abhorred, driving it backwards as it thrashed about, swinging arms, tendrils, and firing blasts every which way, but for every piece of stone the entity destroyed three more took its place. Relief flooded Raven, displacing the fear. Just in time.

"…I get it!" Metatron called from across the room.

"Be quiet Adam!" Robin said, as he watched the Abhorred get torn into, again and again. Of course. All of the Titans could only land singular, large blows against the creature, not subject him to a meat grinder death of a million cuts style attack like Terra. It was working…they had a chance…!

"TITANS, GO!" Robin yelled. "ANYONE WHO CAN HIT IT, HIT IT!"

Gauntlet struck first, finally smashing the Abhorred directly with another chunk of floor which Terra shattered and turned into part of her blitz attack, before Beast Boy smashed the creature flat with a brontosaurus tail. Savior, lacking any other options, just threw his own giant rock that smacked into the creature before he ran over to Raven.

"What happened, Raven? Before Terra woke up? New problem?"

"I…don't…no, hit the Abhorred!" Raven said, as she unleashed what little power she had left on the entity. The Abhorred finally located Terra and unleashed a storm of blasts towards her, but Metatron beat it to the punch it didn't throw, grabbing up Terra and running away with her, the air filling with shrapnel as the blasts detonated across the length of the room. Terra didn't let the sudden trip interrupt her attack, blood running from her nose to join the mess already caked on her face, the Abhorred being torn apart again and again and again…

The Abhorred turned back to the wall, unleashing another storm of blasts, reducing most of the wall to dust before sprinting towards the enlarged opening, trying to escape from the deadly jaws that had seized on it.

"Please don't let it leave." Metatron said, and blurred backwards as Gauntlet, Savior, and Raven threw up a combined makeshift barricade the Abhorred slammed into. It manifested a giant sword and cleaved through it on one strike, movement catching its eye as it turned around. Metatron had run backwards to take a giant leap, and now falling towards the entity, it swung back its sword to bisect him in turn.

"Nope." Metatron said.

The explosion of golden steam shattered the blade, allowing Metatron to slam the glowing white punch directly into the Abhorred's center of mass. Another explosion of white washed over the room, Metatron thrown back from the punch with a grunt, the smell of burning flesh filling Raven's nose. However bad the Titan was hurt, though, the Abhorred was feeling it 100x worse, as it staggered forward, clawing at itself, the rocks still ripping through it over and over and over…

"HIT IT!"

The Titans did, smashing gold and white and black energy into it, flesh and rock, Scalpel even ripping one of his swords from his rope weapon and hurling into the Abhorred. The creature thrashed noiselessly; no screams, no laments, no understanding of how things had so suddenly turned around. It turned back towards the rift, and Raven's heart leapt into her throat again as it reached out one arm.

Then the arm was torn off. The Abhorred did not raise the other. Finally, without a sound, it collapsed, its body bulging and then breaking apart, melting away into nothingness.

For a few seconds, the room was silent, all the Titans holding their breath, waiting for it to spring back to life.

This time, it remained gone.

"Did that work? Good, it worked…ow." Metatron said.

"Met, why didn't you just do that to start with?!" Beast Boy said. Raven just held her head, recalling that it was the same attack Metatron had used on the Lord…and the mysterious explosion of fear.

"Didn't work the first time. So I was waiting for the right time. Didn't want to roast my arm for nothing, you know. Is it weird I think I smell delicious?"

"YES!"

"Okay then!" Metatron said, giving a thumbs up with his other arm.

"…so. You gonna power up now that the fight's done, Vic?" Gauntlet said, looking at the Titan's locked down form as Sophie finally emerged from the shadows again, Scalpel limping over to her.

"No such dramatic timing, Rob. Give me…two more minutes."

"On the positive side, I can see now." Scalpel said, rubbing more of the blinding light out of his eyes as he blinked.

"And you couldn't before?!" Morgue said.

"It was okay. Cy told me where to aim." Scalpel said. Morgue's only response was to pull out her micro-canteen and drink from it, amazed it still held the water she'd put in it after all the abuse.

The fear. Raven's mind kept returning to it. What did it mean…what was she MISSING…

"Well Markov, you sleeping most of the battle wasn't exactly a good thing, but screw that, you came through in the clutch. Big time." Savior said.

"…Oh look. Noel's not actually dead. Good, I didn't want to buy a new funeral dress anyway." Terra said, though for the first time her harsh tone was absent. Maybe it was time to move on.

"You've have just worn pants anyway, sleepyhead."

"Yeah yeah. Give me crap for being unconscious all you like. You know what they say. The creamed always rise to the top."

"…I get it!"

"SHUT UP MET!"

* * *

Shadow after shadow. Death after death. Yet they just kept coming, like a swarm of ants suiciding itself into a river so their fellows could climb over their corpses to safety. But a nest only had so many ants, and Starfire was an exterminator in every sense of the word, every blow and blast shattering more and more of the frail copies, none of them able to even scratch her. One even tried to stab her in the head with a manifested sword, only for the blade to crumple to dust when she blocked with her wrist armor, the momentum of the creature causing it to run into her and disintegrate. Starfire barely even noticed as she fired blasts at retreating shades. So many false enemies, so many mirrors to distort the truth…

None of them the real Lord. He wanted to flee. To escape. To keep her eyes off what was important.

Where do you find a foe so desperate to misdirect and get away?

In a second, the answer came to Starfire, and she turned, aimed, and fired.

At her own shadow. The blast destroyed the ground and brought the screaming, horrifically maimed form of the Lord forth from it, Starfire seizing it as it emerged, all the other shadows popping out of existence around her.

"You claim so much how well you know us. I know you too. Now die." Starfire said, and blew the Lord to pieces in her grasp. Said pieces scattered across the ground, writhing and trying to pull themselves together.

Starfire blasted them, one after another. Some vanished entirely, others writhed and gibbered and slid across the ground, trying to reform together. Starfire followed, her tread steady and unrelenting, blasting every piece she could until the last shreds formed back together into a broken form that could barely be called human, let alone a god.

"Will you beg for mercy? Understand what you did to others? See your self-serving lies for what they are?" Starfire said, following the Lord as he tried to crawl away. Starfire took in the battlefield, making sure there weren't any hidden pieces also trying to crawl away…

Oh look, there _was _one. A quick eyebeam destroyed it, and seeing no others, Starfire resumed her advance. The Lord fired a few last blasts at her, the attacks bursting ineffectively against her body, the alien not even bothering to block them.

"It doesn't matter. You spoke about fertile soil…the soil of your heart is dead. Let its dreams wither on the vine and fade into the darkness you claim is so powerful, never to return." Starfire said, reaching down and seizing the Lord's mass, pulling him up. "Goodbye."

"You can't…kill me…"

"Wrong." Starfire said, igniting her final blast and supercharging it for maximum effect.

It hit her like a tidal wave, washing over her with incomprehensible might and dragging her down into the depths. Not literal water: Aguardiente had not returned to the battlefield. Not an attack at all.

It was emotion. It was fear. Fear so stark and absolute it slammed into her via empathetic osmosis, a greater fear than anything she'd ever felt. Greater than she'd been a slave, a stranger on an alien world, in battle, in helplessness for herself and others. It was a fear she recognized in herself…but one she'd long learned to temper and control. This fear was not tempered, this fear was chained, and in breaking loose, consumed everything before it.

The fear of death.

For one eternal moment, Starfire knew terror unlike anything humanity could conceive.

She endured it. It was not her fear, and her mind and heart were as bright and fierce as the stars she was named after. But its existence, and what it sprang from, so primal and understandable that Starfire couldn't put it to words, stunned her in a way no speech or blow could. It was less an opening of the mind as someone taking the mind, turning it upside down, and ramming it back into its slot as it tried to flip itself back to what it knew.

When the real world swam back into focus again, Starfire found herself with a hand over her mouth. Not in terror, though. In contemplation of the fear.

The frayed chuckle brought her back fully, and her eyes turned back to the Lord, barely a shadow now, but once again on summoned feet.

"I know who's truly dead." The Lord said. "Princess Koriand'r of Tamaran, warrior, who burned bright and cold when needed. All hail Starfire, hero of Earth." The Lord said. Then he chuckled once more, pointing at her with a look that seemed almost piteous.

"Human. All too human."

Then he leapt into the air.

* * *

It was the Lord. It had been the Lord's fear…

…the timing didn't match.

She'd felt it explode over her just when the Abhorred had been about to escape. Escape and carry the power he'd needed back to him. He'd been overwhelmed by fear just before it had been turned away and finally destroyed…

It didn't make sense. He would have, should have, felt the fear when the Abhorred failed…missing…what were they…

The floor.

The Abhorred's remains were gone.

…and so was the power absorbed by it. It hadn't returned to the Foreverwhere, it had just…vanished…

"_It was absorbing power! From the rift!…""…THROUGH the rock?!" "_

Cyborg had blown it outside the room before the Lord had tried to get in. The Abhorred hadn't fled into the tower to find another way to its master, it'd gone right back into the room to keep fighting, because it didn't have much of a mind…

Or…

_The very first rule of magic, of any kind. MISDIRECTION._

It clicked into place. What she'd been missing. What they'd all been missing.

"_The paradisium frameworks in the base of the structure have been badly damaged, go repair them before the ley lines flood the whole island with disintegrative energy…"_

"No." Raven said, and flew towards the hole in the wall.

She felt the violent reverberation beneath her, heard the noise as something ripped through the walls of Etemenanki from within the chambers of the lower depths, even as her friends yelled in surprise.

She reached the shattered wall to see the second Abhorred rip itself from within the lower floors, flying off into the distance. The one the Lord had sent to repair the damage they'd done to the structure's abyss during their fight, after giving him Ryce's necklace. The REAL threat, kept carefully out of sight and mind until it was too late.

Raven was vaguely aware of her friends joining her side, but all she could was watch the Abhorred, realizing even as she knew what it was it out of her range and far out of her power to stop.

Starfire saw it too, and she immediately too to the air after the Lord, her hands summoning her final blast.

Just like the Titans though, she was looking in the wrong place. Until it was too late.

The blast from the Abhorred seemed to teleport from its hands, slamming into Starfire and carrying her away, off over the horizon. Raven's eyes flicked to her vanishing friend, and then back to the Lord.

He was looking right at her. Giving her a salute.

Then he spun his joined fingers in a circle, a lattice of runes appearing beneath his feet and knelt down, the Abhorred settling down over him like a cloak, the clouds splitting and raining down lightning on the ceremony as the Lord merged with his loyal shadow, explosions of terrible power erupting from the rune work before spiralling in turn into the Lord as he rose up, fully reformed and remade, runes appearing all around him before they turned to ash and vanished.

"…please don't tell me we didn't just fall for one of his goddamn tricks _AGAIN_." Beast Boy said.

"Oh. He had another Abhorred. When did he pull that out?" Metatron said.

"Before you arrived." Raven said.

"Oh. That would be what was missing, then."

"Missing for all of us. Damn it." Robin said, a sick feeling creeping over him. He should have remembered…he should have saved Marissa…he should have done more…never enough. "DAMN it."

"Not that I'm not horrified too over here, but I _will _point out we were all horrifically mauled and about to die when he did that." Cyborg called from across the room.

"It doesn't help." Raven said, the dull coldness settling over her again. "We failed."

"_Oh, don't feel too bad Titans. I tend to bring out the worst in people. And you needed your best." _The Lord's voice echoed in their minds. _"How did reason come into the world? As is fitting, in an irrational manner, by accident. One will have to guess at it as a riddle. You didn't solve the riddle."_

"And you didn't listen." Raven said, a dark glean in her eye. "WE failed."

There was no streak of green or red this time. Just a line of dust that seemed to spontaneously erupt across its length, the Lord turning around to Starfire grabbing him and streaking upward into the clouds that they were gone in an eye blink.

"…The author must keep his mouth shut when his work starts to speak." Raven said, slipping her hand into Savior's, hoping and praying.

* * *

The Lord was wrong. Starfire was still a warrior. A queen among them in more than title.

Because she'd been ready.

She'd thought the Lord was done…but she'd been ready if he wasn't. It hadn't kept her from being blasted by the Abhorred, but it'd made sure she'd held as much as her vast new strength in reserve, as much as it hurt to do that. If only for the speed it granted her.

She'd also held on to one final trick she'd thought of and not used, not until now, as she took off into the clouds of dark ash and horrific lightning, taking all the risk of being electrocuted as long as she could hold onto the Lord. To reach the top of the clouds.

The roof of the world. Where the Lord couldn't hide away from the sun.

They burst out, and then there was light. All seeing, all consuming light. Light to chase away the dark.

"…_Ah, my esteemed foe. A good tactic. A good move."_

The upward ascent stopped on a dime. Starfire's eyes widened.

They were in low orbit. They were in direct sunlight. Starfire could feel her body absorbing it.

The Lord just floated there, sigils and runes glowing on his body.

"_But the speed of thought against a MIND reader?"_

The blow slammed through every part of Starfire, breaking her grip on the Lord and sending her plummeting back to Earth.

"Not quite fast enough." The Lord said, looking at the sun for the first time in a long time. The alien had almost been fast enough to get ahead of his magical protection spell. Almost. It was one long overdue. The Lord would have taken a few moments to stare at the distant star that was much his nemesis as the children below, to let it see he'd finally escaped the doom it promised.

Except he realized he was falling as well a second later. Snorting, he spun his body around and plunged down into the clouds after the Titan.

Starfire hit the ground hard, but she landed on her feet, going down to one knee in a three point stance. The Lord re-appeared several dozen feet away, settling down with considerably more grace.

"Magic. Sometimes it inconveniences you…in more than one way…"

Starfire blazed towards the Lord. The Lord exploded into shadow, Starfire flying into it and slowing down to a crawl as the stasis spell took effect, the Lord reappearing another thirty feet away.

"I was talking. Let me finish." The Lord said. "Magic. You see how it troubles you…and yet troubles me…it's strange…despite all my changes and peaks and valleys in this fight, I just can't seem to…shake…that disabling curse your sorceress put on me that keeps me from flying. It's like an itch I just can't seem to scratch…much like you and your fellow children. My own persistent niggling shard of chaos."

The Lord raised his hands, portals of darkness appearing on the ground. Then the ravens poured out, the murder that had warned the Titans when they'd set foot on the island.

"One must still have chaos within himself to give birth to a dancing star." The Lord said, the ravens flying towards him, merging with him, forming above him. "A light has dawned for me: Zarathustra shall not speak to the people but to companions! Zarathustra shall not be herdsman and dog to the herd! To lure many away from the herd-that is why I have come. The people and the herd shall be angry with me: the herdsmen shall call Zarathustra a robber. I will not be herdsmen or gravedigger. I will not speak again to the people: I have spoken to a dead man for the last time. I will make company with creators, with harvesters, with rejoicers: I will show them the rainbow and the stairway to the Superman."

The black wings flared out, carrying the Lord into the sky. With a snap of his fingers, the Lord freed Starfire from his field of darkness. It was time for the final act to play out.

"_**THUS SPAKE ZARATHUSTRA."**_

Starfire flew in, and once more the island shook.

* * *

Raven watched it all. The faded hope, the unanswered prayer. The fall. The rise. The cycle.

She closed her eyes for a moment, and then turned back to her companions.

"The rift. We have to seal it. NOW." Raven said. " 'God' needs to _**DIE**_."


	11. Truly, Madly, Deeply

Chapter 11: Truly, Madly, Deeply

…_**You must understand. Absolute perfection is impossible. Even God needed six days to create the universe, and he had to rest after it.**_

_**I did far better by her than the world would have.**_

_**The world abandoned her, and when she punished them for it, they began baying for blood. They would never, COULD never realize that what they suffered was their own doing. Forget being unable to read minds; it was simple, pure selfishness. They didn't want to look at the ugly thing, because it raised too many questions about them for why such a thing would exist. When it bit them, they acted like it was all the biter's fault. They always do.**_

_**I vowed to do more. I did just that.**_

_**You can curse the end result all you want. I looked at my options, and I made the best of them. I gave her a chance that never would have been within your capability or your capacity. Go ahead and rail against it. Just like you did her.**_

_**You're failures. All of you. And you CHOSE to be so. Embrace it. Call it what's needed and best.**_

_**I will not tolerate it.**_

_**From anyone.**_

The sun had been vanishing over the horizon when the fog swept over the isolated forest road. Nearby animals fled into the forest, even the insects falling silent, as the forms bloomed within the unnaturally deep mist.

The girl's clothing had gotten considerably better, the young woman now clad in what looked like a workman's jumpsuit and overalls, her belt weighed down with numerous tools and a pair of goggles over her eyes. When she stepped out of the mist, it was with refined confidence. At least, for two steps.

Then she realized she had no idea where she was.

"…Are we making a stop beforehand?" The woman said, turning around and pulling up the goggles from her Hispanic features.

"_**No."**_

"What? You're dropping me off? How are we going to coordinate?"

"_**We're not."**_

The realization finally dawned on the girl, the darkness before her creeping over her features.

"You fucking IDIOT."

"_**I looked at what had happened, and what will, and made a choice." **_The Lord said. _**"You wanted to be free from her. She wanted to be free from you. I gave you what you wanted, as best I could. From what's come since…I've made a decision. And it no longer includes you."**_

"You're going to fuck up and fail. You just want to make sure that everyone around you pats you on the back as you do it. You're a bigger idiot than-"

The hand of darkness reached out, seizing onto Zia Mori's throat.

"_**FALL SILENT." **_The Lord hissed, darkness settling on the surrounding trees and road like an equally clenching hand. _**"I did what you asked, what I promised. I gave you guidance and power to destroy your maker. I took you away from the chains of your birth that you so despised. I did this all as best I could, and you know full well how much better my efforts were than this wretched world's. From what's come, I've considered what's to come. AND YOU PROVE YOURSELF UNWORTHY OF IT BY THE WAY WORDS YOU CHOOSE."**_

"FUCK YOU."

"_**So you want to die then? Self-negation?"**_ The Lord said, hoisting her off the ground. _**"I know that's not in you. I should know more than anyone. So I would highly advise you SHUT UP."**_

The Lord released his grip, the woman sprawling at his feet.

"…You don't want anything effective. You want a puppet who won't fight back. So FUCK YOU."

The Lord's eyes blazed, and Zia was nearly knocked out of what felt like her skin itself.

"_**I give you freedom. More than just the clothes on your back. I could very well have thrown you out, or slit your throat for your ingratitude, but you are not trash. You are simply not needed. No matter HOW you phrase it."**_ The Lord said. _**"Go. Miss Mori, or whatever you are. You can go to the heroic world if you wish, in revenge, but I will remind you you still have the face of a hated mass murderer. You know full well how this world will treat you. Use what you have. I'm sure you can eke something out. But our time together is done. Try and prove otherwise at your peril."**_

"Fuck you. I'll be the last one standing. NOT YOU."

"…_**Do try. Learn the hard way. YOUR ARMS ARE TOO SHORT TO BOX WITH GOD."**_

The mist faded into oblivion, the girl having already turned and begun to walk away, the stars beginning to come out overhead. She walked. She raged. She hated. It was all she was, after all.

She was, also, a survivor.

It was not a condition she planned to share.

_**How do you fix a mind cracked in half? You cannot. So you make the best of what remains, and rebuild as best you can. You don't waste time with pointless efforts, ones that won't make a difference in the end. You don't destroy it because of what spilled out when it cracked. Especially when it broke at your hands.**_

_**That's the thing, you see. I'll do what's needed. I'll do what your worthless moralities and delusional hypocrisies can't. I'll FIX things. I'll pay the price you think is too high. I'll get up and fight the battles you cringe away from. I'll do what's BEST for the world.**_

_**You WILL understand this. Or you will be swept away.**_

_**Because unlike God, I'm going to keep trying until I get it right.**_

* * *

_The world is always doomed. _How had that line ever become a joke?

It seemed like the last and absolute worst time for rumination, but as Starfire floated in the air, the sea roaring beneath her and lightning crashing down on the violated face of _La Voix_, she found herself doing it anyway. She couldn't sense the Lord, her natural and honed faculties amplified tenfold from her time in the Foreverwhere rift, and she doubted he had run away. Where was he, then? What was he plotting? A wary glance at the Etemenanki tower revealed nothing new or unusual there. Scanning the ground and then the horizon indicated nothing in turn. Starfire glanced up at the clouds, the mass of dark vapor and ash still overflowing with electricity. Nothing.

She'd _HAD _him, she knew. Just a little more and the Lord would be done being a plague on their house. He'd known it too; Starfire hadn't spent all the time she had with Raven without picking up a few things about emotion. The empathic attack on her had been as much legitimate, overwhelming desperation as it had been his last effort to stop her.

It was strange, knowing the enemy felt fear, especially something as inhuman in body and soul as the Lord. That did not concern Starfire though.

It was what had come after the fear. The re-empowerment, the Lord having again proven too treacherous for her friends to counter…just when she'd had him pinned and cold. He should have been enraged. He should have been trying to punish her. Instead…

A few traded blows, and then he'd vanished. Not enough of an encounter to gage just how far he'd gone back up the power scale either. What was he planning? How far did the cloud cover go?

…He'd shielded himself from direct sunlight. This-

The movement caught Starfire's eyes, the alien whirling around. Nearby, the Lord floated, long lengths of shadow forged into his latest cloak, his eyes greater pinpricks of darkness against his ebony face. His arms were crossed casually, his head tilted to one side. Just watching her.

He had not been there three seconds ago. Starfire felt the next two crawl by.

_**Expecting another speech?**_

The voice was like a cold thread impaling through her brain.

_**No need. It's all been said.**_

The air visibly rippled when Starfire slammed her fist home, a thunder crack sending free floating ash into violent displacement from the impact tremor, the clouds above them splitting in a chasm as the force displaced itself.

The Lord did not budge, Starfire's radiant hand burning against his forearm.

"And you're done." The Lord said, and punched back. Another crack shattered the air. Another line gorged itself across the black clouds.

Starfire mirrored her enemy, his fist caught against her interlaced hands, her eyes blazing in contrast to the void of her foe's.

"No." Starfire said, and the pair vanished.

No more noise followed. Instead, a fireworks show began, eruptions of green and flashes of black sprawled across the sky at speeds just under comprehension. The last flash of black and emerald was met with a third color, blazing white, as a lightning bolt crashed down from the abyss above La Voix and split the warring halves like a razor applied to a throat. The blackness flared, and then a second flash of light seemed to answer, striking the darkness and driving it down into the dead rock of the island below, green whirling away and heading back down to earth via a different route. Smoking, the Lord pulled himself up from the crater he'd made, the sound barrier breaking as Starfire streaked towards him.

"No." The Lord echoed, and swung out a hand before Starfire reached him. The black explosion consumed both of them.

Starfire hit the ground, the Lord walking on, one hand still out.

"Did you really think that a bolt of lightning would hit-"

The Lord snapped his head around at the rumbling, crushing ululation that sounded behind him, Starfire rising and turning around as the ground shattered and rose around her. The Lord's eyes narrowed in dark frustration.

"You AND Drake. Perhaps he got it from yo-?"

Starfire's fist shattered the Lord's face, his last syllable drawing out as his jaw distended and his features warped under the blow, the sound barrier breaking again as the Lord flew backwards. His form twisted into a roiling funnel and then vanished, the Lord teleporting a mile away.

No sooner were his feet on the ground then Starfire was on him, her arms blurring as she smashed blow after blow into him, the ground ripping up beneath the Lord's feet as he was driving backwards, his own arms a dark mass that blunted every blow Starfire threw.

Then he caught her fist.

He promptly stopped on a dime, and with an eruption of black energy, Starfire was the one flying backwards. The Lord leapt after the alien, his leg flashing out and catching her in the spine, the alien sent into an out of control tumble before the Lord fired off a blast of energy that slammed into the alien and tripled her speed. The cliff face loomed out of nowhere, the Titan slamming into it and drilling all the way through before she broke out the other end, falling down onto the ground on the other side.

Within a second she was in the air again, going straight back the way she had come. The cliff shattered before her, the whole rock face blasted and rattled to pieces as Starfire flew right back at it towards the Lord. The Lord met her, the impact shattering another hole in the ground as the Lord flew up into the sky, Starfire grappling with him before she hurled him backwards. Her hands slammed together, a green lance of energy firing towards the Lord, the Lord meeting it with his own blast.

"You think history will play out the same way? That I can't take the heat?" The Lord said, and took one hand away from his blast, holding it up above him. Around the tortured island, the waters of the Atlantic ocean continued to boil and thrash.

Then they began to slow.

Then the ice began to form, racing across the surface of the salt water, waves freezing in mid-roil, the ice manifesting for miles around La Voix before it began to stab into the depths. Above the Lord, the sphere of red began to form, the concentrated heat stolen from billions upon billons of gallons of seawater, Starfire breaking off her directed beam and flying back, her eyes wide. The Lord cut off his own attack, the orb above him having reached the side of an apartment building.

"Can you?" The Lord said, and hurled the heat sphere at the Titan.

Starfire promptly flew right through it.

"What the-GUYYYYHHHHH!" The Lord snarled as Starfire's blazing hands slammed into him, the heat sphere dissipating behind him. That was the problem when he worked with non-darkness based magic; he had trouble maintaining it.

"I channel the stars, monster. I go out into the depths of space and bathe in their unprotected embrace for light years. SO YES." Starfire said, and punched the Lord into the ground again.

For a moment, the Lord lay there, before Starfire crashed down feet first, splitting the ground open further before the Lord re-appeared to her right.

"Can you?" The Lord repeated. Starfire did as well, the Lord's chest caving in as she drove her fist into it.

* * *

"She's still winning, right? Like, the Lord might have powered up again-" Terra was saying, before Gauntlet briefly cut her off with an angry "FUCCCCKKKKKK!" "But Star's still keeping up with him! Even WITH all the new power!"

"FUCCCCCCCCCKKKKK!"

"That's good, right Robin? She can match him! Still! Even WITH the-" Terra said, and stopped talking in case Gauntlet wanted to curse again. Her hunch proved to be correct.

"Rob, I get it. Stow it. Still." Robin said, looking at the distant battle before he looked back at Raven. "Rae, an indication of a good idea would be good now. I'll even take an inkling of one."

"How 'bout an inference?" Savior said, standing near Raven as she gazed into the depths of the Foreverwhere void.

"I'll settle for any letter of the alphabet." Robin said. Savior just looked back at Raven, her gaze slightly unfocussed, the burning white dancing across the cool dark purple of her irises.

"I don't think the issue is whether or not we can close that rift." Morgue said, holding out a piece of stone that Scalpel was slowly carving into a dagger (as a weapon for this war, it was sorely lacking, but Morgue trusted it more than her bare hands) "It's more likely if it can be done before the Lord comes over here to raise an objection over the fact."

"This is why you're my favorite." Metatron said, abruptly next to Sophie, petting her like a cat while Scalpel looked on with dull annoyance. "So sensible and not-melodramatically heroic."

"I happen to think some melodrama is good for the palette every now and then." Savior said.

"FUCCCCCCCCCCCCCKKKKK!"

"There's always exceptions, of course."

Robin looked at Raven again, but she remained before the rift, staring into it. Running one hand through sweaty, bloody hair, Robin paced over to the fallen form of Marissa Mori, her hands carefully tied behind her back and her unconscious body leaned against one of the remaining walls. Lacking anything else to do, he checked her vitals, trying to filter out the background noises to locate her pulse.

"Nothing's changed since the last time you did that, Tim." Cyborg said. The Titan had finally gotten enough emergency power back online to move around again, but for the most part he was staying away from the giant hole in the wall, his battered metal form and the far-duller-than-normal inner light that he usually had from said lack of power proving an odd uniformity to the dull dark rock and crystal of Etemenanki. "So, this is her, huh? The Mori girl."

"Yeah."

"…I hate to say it, fearless-"

"This is not Old Yeller, Cyborg. She's not rabid. She's not like the ones locked up in Arkham either. None of this is her fault." Robin said, his face grim.

"It's not yours either, Robin. You can't watch every part of Jump every second of every day. There's going to be stuff we miss. Sometimes…" Cyborg shook his head.

"It's more than just that…" Robin said. "You weren't watching when we fought…but she had protection. _Selective _protection. Debris, shrapnel, it bounced off her…but I was able to knock her out. Between and her sudden insanity…"

"The Lord." Raven suddenly said, turning around.

"He's coming back? Savior said, tensing up.

"No, sorry…was answering Tim. I could hear everyone." Raven said, as she briefly drifted over to Marissa. "The Lord did this. Part of his ritual was to take the angry ghosts that inhabited this island and use them as part of his 'engine', down in the depths of this place. He put magical protection on Marissa to protect her from attack…but it was all based towards the physical. Not the psychological. Why would he consider that? He feeds on whatever they could throw at him."

"…And when he pulled me away, he abandoned her to them." Robin said, his head down and voice grim.

"…so leaving the daughter of Death home was in fact really REALLY a terrible choice," Gauntlet pointed out, and was promptly ignored.

"Why not? His spells would preserve her life. Her mind? Why, he could just fix that later. After all, he's done such a good job so far." Raven said, her voice as bitter as coffee. "The ghosts cut deep. Between that and what he's already done…her brain's unravelling. Maybe that's why the protective spells didn't stop you from knocking her unconscious. It couldn't think of anything else to do to stop the degeneration."

"Robin, Raven…" Scalpel said quietly, his voice briefly drowned out by an explosion. "I know you have a personal aspect to this fight in regards to this girl, but I must insist that our other problem takes precedent."

"Agreed. How do we close that rift, Raven?" Cyborg said.

"…There are several possibilities." Raven said, staying next to Robin and Marissa. "Number one is the fact this structure is needed to make all this work. The rift, the ghosts, the ley lines, this is the heart pumping all those lifebloods."

"All right! Nothing solves a problem like excessive property damage…is what I'd say if I knew there wasn't a catch." Gauntlet said. "What's the catch?"

"The structure's self-repairing. It doesn't seem to affect negligible things like that hole in the wall, but remember what happened when Cyborg blasted it with his ship cannon? Same issue…I don't know if we could properly tear it down even if we were fresh." Raven said.

"What about the communications barrier? Maybe we can get through that, call for help. The Lord and this place has taken a pounding, maybe it's weakened." Cyborg said.

"It might be…but I wouldn't even know where to start, Victor. And we don't have the time to learn." Raven said.

"…wait, wait. Those ley lines, down below, that's like a pool of super lava. Maybe we can break something in the foundations, make the place fall into it-" Gauntlet said.

"Super lava to us, not to this building. It was built with its power. Wouldn't work." Raven said. Gauntlet cursed again, then snapped his fingers.

"Terra. You got that volcano to blow. Do it again. Bigger. Make a pyro classic cloud or whatever it's called." Gauntlet said, pointing, only to grimace when Terra did. "Let me guess. Too worn out."

"Even if I wasn't, Gauntlet…"

"Are you SURE? I read the files about Light City, you did that trick with lava there!"

"There's a difference between lava and a full-blown volcano, Gauntlet." Robin said.

"Plus, even if she COULD do it, you think Ricky wouldn't notice?" Metatron said. "That's the big thing here; What's Ricky paying attention to? I assume that's why you're not trying to tap the Foreverwhere yourself again, Raven."

"He'll notice. I can tell." Raven said.

"Savior did something, and hell, Star's out there getting her Exhale impression on, or whatever her god was named, maybe one of us can tap it instead?" Terra said.

"I took a big risk, nearly blew my head up, and in exchange got Cyborg to move for ten extra seconds. If it had any other effects, I sure can't see them." Savior said. "Am I wrong, Raven?"

"No…no tapping it." Raven said, slowly drifting back to the Foreverwhere rift.

"All right then. How do we close it?" Robin said. "Don't leave anything off the table, Raven."

"…well, if you put it that way, there's one guarantee." Raven said, not looking at her teammates.

"What?"

"Blood magic. Sacrifice. You've seen what the Lord can do with a group of unwilling souls…one given willingly, though? With the right magicks? Could close this easily." Raven said, looking at her teammates. "The downside is…well, obvious."

Her teammates looked back, some tired, some grim, some unreadable. _Who's going to die?_

"…But you have something else." Robin said.

"I think I do." Raven said, as she glanced upward. Should she mention…no. What was already on the table as a last resort was bad enough. "The Lord's made me run through a lot of my tricks…but I don't have NOTHING left up my sleeve. Not yet." Raven said, a shadow portal manifesting and bringing an old, familiar object.

"Your mirror?" Savior said.

"Wait…that's just a portal into your mind, isn't it? How will that help?" Terra said.

"Sure helped when the Lord tried to kill us with a black hole." Beast Boy said.

"That won't work again. The Lord was new to his power…by the nature of what this is, I was able to make it 'ignore' an attack that was purely of the natural world…he's laced all his attacks with magic now to prevent just that." Raven said. "But I haven't let this mirror of mine gather dust. Since the Sahara, I've worked on it to have other abilities, other techniques…never had to use it in the field since then, but first time for everything."

"So you can use that to close the rift? Without the Lord knowing?" Morgue said.

"Nope." Metatron said, causing all the Titans to snap their eyes towards his crouching form. "Can't keep him from noticing, that is. You did too well, guys. Hurt him too much, came too close. He's trying to watch the whole board now, even with his fight with Kory. This isn't about keeping him from realizing, never was."

"It's doing it in a way that he won't properly notice until he's too late. Because as much as he's tried to improve, his flaws just run too deep. If they didn't, he'd have killed us all by now at least five times." Raven said. "You heard him, over and over. He wants to break us. Destroy us. If we, if I can do this properly…between his constant blind spots and Kory, he won't realize what we're up to until it's too late. The rest would be up to Kory; she knows what to do. It's what she's doing right now. And if need be…the rest of you." Raven said.

"What's the plan, Raven?" Robin said.

"The thing about the _Aeternus Locus_ is that it's neutral. It's possibly what gifts universes with magic, and magic can be used for good or evil. The _Locus _is just there as the source of the power. It has no direction of its own." Raven said. "My mirror helps show the truth of things. If I use it as a focus, I might be able to make the power within realize it's being misused, that it's not being drawn on for a neutral purpose. Make it reject the Lord, call back its energies and close itself. That will hopefully take him out completely, or at least leave him so weakened that we'd be able to finish the job."

"Downsides?" Savior said.

"It might not work. The Lord might be too hyper-paranoid to trick him this time…I'm going by history there. And if it doesn't work…" Raven said, and left the last part unsaid. _Then that leaves the last resort. And its cost._

"…It'll work." Savior said.

"Hopefully." Raven said.

"No Raven. It will. You're doing it. You're the strongest person I know." Savior said. "No matter how hard the Lord stepped on you, how ANYTHING stepped on you, you took it and got back up. There's no bottom to your strength, Raven. There is nothing you can't do."

"Technically that's the Green Lanterns." Gauntlet said. Terra elbowed him in the ribs. "Ow, my capacity to beware!"

Raven couldn't help but smile a bit. There was no empty flattery in Noel's words, no cynical tactical manipulation. She didn't have to be his girlfriend to know that. He'd considered the situation and put absolute faith in her. They all did.

Always. Ever since she'd stepped forth from Azarath with a destiny of damnation.

"Then let's begin." Raven said, turning back to face the Foreverwhere. "Azarath, Metrion, Zinthos…Azarath Metrion Zinthos…"

"Scalpel, Morgue, Gauntlet, you stick near the hole. Keep watch, don't expose yourself. Beast Boy, Terra, Cyborg, Savior, you stay further in. Keep watch around Raven. Metatron, you're the free floater in this room. All of you, keep an eye on everything and hope that the Lord's own everything is too busy being blackened up by Starfire." Robin said.

Nods of affirmation. No words needed.

Then Etemenanki fell away. Surprise shot through Robin, as he began to tumble.

"_Robin, it's me. Raven."_

"_Raven? What are you doing?" Robin said, his comrades fading from his vision, a drifting purple void consuming his gaze._

"_The part I didn't want to tell our teammates about. Because only we can do it. Only we're close enough. We have to save her, Tim. YOU have to save her. That's why I originally had the mirror. It was for her…what the Lord did to her head. Things have changed…but that has not. I'll tell you what to do, Tim. The rest will be up to you."_

"…_Wait, you're going to try and close the rift AND fix Marissa at the same time? Raven…"_

"_It's the only way, Tim. If we wait, even if we win…it will be too late. The Lord's actions, his oversights…they've done too much damage. We need to do it now. I can shoulder it. I know you can as well."  
"…what are you not telling me?"_

There was no answer.

"_I can tell, Raven. I know you too well. You're holding SOMETHING back. What is it?"_

"_Nothing that you or any of us can affect or change. If I spoke of it…all it'd do is add to your worries. The trade off of knowing is not worth it. Please trust me, Robin. If it was any other way…"_

"_All right."_

"…_Thank you."_

"…_He's right you know." _Robin said, as he began a slow fall into whatever lay below. _"You ARE the strongest person I know."_

"_I should hope so." _Raven said, her voice drifting all around Robin. "Because I'm not ready to die yet."

* * *

She wanted a drink.

She wanted a drink so bad.

She'd never been so…. _**intimately**_ into her friends' minds. So connected. So close to their own deaths and all she wanted was to guzzle whiskey until she could no longer comprehend what she was feeling and seeing and hearing. Nothing more than an alcoholic voyeur in a dry room to people who she'd like to think trusted her. Ryce rested her head on the counter and tried to keep the shakes from her limbs.

A light clink…a warm woody smell.

"Here."

Disgust and hate and a twisted curling love filled her heart and left a rotted sweet taste in her mouth.

Ryce lashed a hand out and knocked the whiskey filled tumbler from the surface to crash on the floor.

She didn't look at her father.

If they all came home whole, she made a promise to never touch it again.

* * *

The ground ripped out, choking black fog flying out and engulfing Starfire. She took the blow better than she had the volcanic ash, her power distorting and then casting away the fog while the Lord settled down in front of her. She fired off a Starbolt with her left hand, then her right as the Lord dodged aside, and then spun and hurled a third Starbolt, this one striking the ground. Instead of exploding, it skim-blazed across the ground, almost catching the Lord before he leapt over it.

"That's new." The Lord said, and zipped in, Starfire blocking his punches and kicks with her forearms. The Lord teleported backwards, throwing out a kick as Starfire gave chase, their heels slamming together before the Lord teleported away again. No sooner had the Lord teleported back down to the ground then Starfire followed, an eruption of green fire blasting up from her fist as the Lord teleported again. "What else do you have?"

Starfire just charged. The Lord threw a blast; Starfire ducked under it. He immediately followed with a black energy spear erupting from the ground; Starfire stopped on a dime and dodged backwards. That, the Lord expected.

He did not expect her to lance forward to dodge his second erupting spear, her fist exploding with green fire and driving towards the Lord again. The Lord teleported away again, but he didn't go far enough, Starfire immediately turning around and ramming into him as he re-appeared, her fists smashing him up into the air before she spun, delivering a Starbolt-charged backhand that slammed the Lord into the ground.

_Right then. You can dish it out. How well can you TAKE it?_

Starfire wasn't wholly sure how long the Lord's psychic message took in real time; just that when it finished in her head the Lord had slammed her backwards with a bladed arcing kick and fired a buzz saw like blade into her back. Starfire whirled around, smashing the disc only for the ground to explode, a line of upward blasts catching her and knocking her backwards heads over heels. A familiar coldness slammed over her, her perceptions slowing; the Lord had summoned another one of his stasis spheres behind her.

"Well?" The Lord said, teleporting near Starfire and raising a hand, red energy surging into his fist before he swung it back.

The stasis sphere exploded, Starfire's whole body ablaze with power, her own hand erupting in strength. The Lord moved to intercept her.

Too slow. The alien's fist slammed into the Lord, throwing him backwards for a pregnant second before he exploded in green fire. Reeling, the Lord turned around to find Starfire uppercutting him into the sky, following behind him with the same inhuman speed to smash him into the ground, and then actually beating him down to the ground, her left fist flooring him and then her flowing right fist smashing into his face, Starfire grabbing her fist and opening her hand, emerald brilliance engulfing both her and the Lord, the ground beneath her charring to ash as her power exploded, the Lord flying across the island, finally coming to a stop several hundred feet away, his cloak digging into the ground as he settled back down to earth.

Starfire did her best to conceal her, striking an aggressive pose that dared the Lord to make the next move.

"Don't bother, Titan." The Lord said. "I feed on darkness. And regretful pain certainly falls under it."

"You think I regret what I'm doing to you?"

"Oh no. But that burning that's starting to grow in you? The burning you can't seem to lock away in a box? What did you expect, alien?" The Lord said. Starfire did her best to keep her face neutral. The pain didn't matter. It had never mattered before and it wasn't going to start now. "There's always a price to pay to become a god."

"One you _will _pay. IN FULL." Starfire said, and took to the air, shoving the pain that had started to creep across her muscles back down into the depths it had emerged from.

"I'm sure." The Lord said, and vanished again.

* * *

"_Raven, can you hear me? Can you talk?" _Robin said. He could see darkness beginning to bloom beneath him, and he was pretty sure that when he went through that, he'd be wherever he was going.

"_Yes, for now, but don't count on that staying that way." _Raven said. From her own viewpoint, she was still in Etemenanki, but the rest of the world had fallen away. The room's coloration had inverted, going from blacks and purples to whites and golds, her friends having vanished like early morning fog. It was just her, the rift, and when she closed her eyes, what Robin saw. In reality, she floated before said rift, her teammates doing their best to guard her and watch as the Lord and Starfire warred across the island.

"_What am I getting myself into?" _Robin said. Raven exhaled dry air between her teeth.

"_A normal person's mind can be messy and chaotic by itself. Marissa's suffered severe trauma, developed a split personality over it…but that's gone now, Robin. The Lord tried to fix it…but he doesn't have the skill or the appropriate powers to even start repairing something like that. So he just ripped out the bad parts and tried to juryrig what was left together into some sort of functional whole."_

"…_ripped them out."_

"_It'll be like a coal seam fire, Robin. A veneer of stability over a broken sea of glass."_

"_Pitfalls everywhere."_

"_That's just the framework. The rest of her mind will manifest too, but due to the Lord's idiocy…they could manifest in some really bad ways, Robin. And it's not just her in there. It's his handiwork too. Even if he hasn't left actual defences, what you're going into, he might as well have. Not to mention whatever those tortured ghosts have managed to sink their teeth into."  
"So, what's my advantage?"_

"_I've learned a lot about these kind of projections since Gar and Victor accidentally snuck into my brain. Marissa's unstable, but you're not. In the perceived reality, you can potentially pass that stability on. It won't fix anything long term, but it'll save her from catatonia. Or worse, complete psychosis."_

"_What do I do?"_

"…_Don't attack anything. Defend yourself if you have to, but if you start throwing punches, her brain's going to read you as another enemy and you'll just make things worse. Look for signs of decay, or agents. Termites, rust, fungus, anything like that…think of what you'd need to clear it away and I'll do the rest. And Robin…she's confused. Very, very confused. The Lord took full advantage of her vulnerability; we can't use those tactics. We use the truth. And…chances are, the truth will probably hurt you even more than her."_

"_I had a feeling you were going to say that_." Robin said.

The darkness reached out, grasping him with something that almost resembled tenderness.

It was the kind of grasp someone used for a favored weapon.

* * *

"What the heck happened to Robin?" Beast Boy said.

"Considering Raven's not flipping out over it, probably nothing bad. Probably." Savior said, before looking at Metatron.

"Yes?"

"Oh, sorry, thought you might know something."

"It's not Ricky, that I'll tell you." Metatron said. "He's generally not one for being sneaky…generally."

"I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but what are we going to do if Raven's plan doesn't work?" Morgue said. "She and Robin have kind of left us hanging."

"Met, what about that special thing you have, the one you said you got from a forest or something, it's worked so far. What about that?"

"Definitely could work. If Ricky decides to drop everything and act like a TOTAL idiot. He's done that before, but he's done it…less…as time goes on." Metatron said. "The problem with some thing that refuses to die is that even a moron learns eventually."

"But he HAS done it before." Terra said.

"That he has. Don't worry your pretty little head. I know how to take my shots. I'll do what I have to do."

"…Victor, I don't suppose you have any ability to blow yourself up or something." Scalpel said.

"Not in any way that would make a difference." Cyborg said.

"Worst comes to worst, I'm sticking my hand into the Foreverwhere. I don't care what Raven said, OR you, Savior." Terra said.

"Quite frankly Terra, if it gets that bad, I'll probably be right behind you." Savior said, looking at Metatron. "WILL it get that bad?"

"Maybe. Maybe not." Metatron said. "Even I can't tell you for sure, Noel. You never know what to expect sometimes. Before it happens."

* * *

The chunk of ice seemed to hang in the air, the black slash suspending it before the truck-sized mass was hurled towards Starfire. The alien shattered it to pieces with one punch, as well as the next one, and the next, the giant projectiles hurled at terrifying speeds that still couldn't match the Titan's reflexes. Neither could the Lord, flying in the shadow of the last glacier, only for Starfire's fist to find his face as well, her other hand grabbing onto him and hurling him down into the ocean's frozen expanse, a mountain of ice shattering and falling down onto him.

Starfire floated down, waiting. The Lord's explosive blast from beneath the ice sent a storm of deadly frozen shrapnel through the air, but any ice that went near Starfire flash-sizzled into nothingness, the ice further melting and swirling in a dark void beneath the Lord's feet as he floated up.

"_**Not bad, Anders. Of course, you're probably all too aware of that."**_ The voice said, echoing in Starfire's head with disturbing intimacy. _**"Because it means not GOOD, either. You had me so close and lost the chance…perhaps you're simply less motivated when you're not beating a helpless bag of mush?"**_

Starfire's eyes flickered with green, but she remained where she was, ice cracking beneath her feet.

"_**Ah, good, good. Good control, Koriand'r of Tamaran. You and your lover are so alike in that fashion." **_The Lord said in that same time-distorting thoughtspeak. _**"Tell me I'm wrong, though. Tell me the momentum…"**_

Starfire's hand was seized this time, the Lord's hands clamping onto her wrist.

"Hasn't shifted." The Lord said. Starfire's eyes blasted lasers; the Lord's neck twisted at a horrific angle to dodge them outright. "Hasn't it?"

The Lord's form vanished, but when he next appeared the shoe popped onto the other foot, Starfire blocking his attempted sword-slice with her wrist armor.

"Then again…" The Lord said, before Starfire thrust her arms forward, the blade snapping like kindling. The Lord staggered a moment before he fired back with his own punch; Starfire stopped it dead by throwing one of her own. The ice beneath them shattered, but neither of the pair budged; the Titan promptly made the Lord pay for standing his ground by ramming her other fist repeatedly into his side before slamming it across his face. _That _succeeded in staggering him a step, Starfire juking in once more.

Her punch would have connected if the Lord's head and shoulders didn't promptly, and again, distend away from her blow in a way it was impossible for flesh to move. Thrown off balance, Starfire was nearly knocked out of her boots by the Lord's counter-punch, his body snapping back into traditional shape as Starfire crashed down onto the ground. The Lord smirked and then leapt into the air, blades extending from his knuckles as he punched downward at his enemy. Starfire promptly curled up and thrust herself off the ground, her feet slamming into the Lord's chest and knocking him down in turn as she landed on her feet.

"Then _again_." The Lord said, and blurred away, his arms blurring as he manifested an energy sphere the size of his body, hurling it towards Starfire. The alien blurred away in turn, the attack not coming anywhere near her.

How purposeful that was immediately became clear when the Lord jerked around, blocking Starfire's punch from behind him with his wrist. Black energy exploded as his arm distorted, liquid shadow threads twining out and seizing onto her wrists, shoulders, and legs, grabbing onto her armor and proving far more resilient than the last mass of dark tendrils the Lord had tried to grab Starfire with. The alien reared back, trying to rip and burn free from the grasp, and when the tendril's grip on her proved to be even more stubborn she exploded backwards, energy ripping from her eyes and trying to snap every strand. She almost succeeded entirely, only the last remaining tendril attached to her wrist holding her to the Lord.

That was when he grabbed onto the tendril and yanked, dark magic exploding behind Starfire and completely reversing her momentum, the Lord yanking her backwards into a thundering punch that sent blood spraying from Starfire's face and shattered the ground beneath them. Starfire flew backwards, only to get yanked back into the Lord's grasp again, the Lord axe-kicking the alien across the ground, then whirling and spinning her like a hammer throw sphere, smashing her through the dense glacial ice. Starfire spun despite the blow, trying to escape, her hard ripping and burning at the handcuff around her wrist, but her efforts were futile, and she found her body swung up and then back down towards the ground.

Directly into the destructive orb she had dodged mere moments before. The explosion cracked the hills of ice all around the impact zone, ice and water exploding upwards from the blast, the wind of it ruffling the Lord's cloaks as the tendril dissolved.

In the blink of an eye, he was by the watery hole his blast had cut in the ice. A wave of his hand blew away the smoky air, revealing the shattered masses of ice floating among the waves…and a Tamarianian body, face down. Unmoving.

"…You're not dead." The Lord said, manifesting another sword. Then a strange expression crossed his face. "Why would you be…"

Water flash-erupted into steam as Starfire blasted out of her failed attempt at playing possum. The Lord met her with a downward slash.

Starfire's punch altered at the last microsecond, her other arm snapping up as she twisted her punching arm's wrist, snagging the sword between her gauntlets. Instead of snapping it, this time she spun with it, throwing the Lord into the air before Starfire blurred up and smashed him into the ground, the Lord's form tearing across the ice and into the rock of Etemenanki before he came to a stop.

Starfire's follow-up punch met the Lord's own forearm.

"…Same old shit." The Lord said. "Tell me I'm wrong. Tell me who the liar is."

Starfire exploded into a fury of punches, the Lord's cloaks flaring up to serve as his defence.

"_**No one lies so boldly as the man who is indignant."**_

* * *

"I wonder when we get to move on to an anime from the 2000's." Gauntlet said, watching the fight through the makeshift 'window' and trying not to show his concern.

"Half of every anime made then was inspired by this." Beast Boy said.

"And everything's inspired by Shakespeare. So I guess we should only make Shakespearean references?"

"Forsooth, dude."

"At least it's not the one with all the Christian robots." Terra said, before looking at Metatron. "Hey. Adam. Can you like, read and see if the Lord's power levels are dropping and stuff?"

"You want the bad news or the really bad news first?"

"I want the GOOD news."

"There's always room for Jello. I just saved a bunch of money on my car insurance by switching to Geico. Dude, you're getting a Dell. Winston tastes good like a cigarette should. Sorry, I jump around so much I can never tell what's hip in memes." Metatron said. "So, the bad news is Ricky's still sucking away at that Locust rift like a…do locusts suck? Well, they suck, but do they SUCK?"

"They bite." Beast Boy said.

"That too, but do they SUCK?"

"No Adam. They bite to eat. Please don't make me turn into one and demonstrate it on your nose." Beast Boy said, his tone a weird mix of amused, terse, and annoyance that he would be terse instead of amused.

"Like a leech then. The REALLY bad news is Raven can't stop that, or he'll immediately know something's wrong and come over here and probably kill all of us. So…who wants to keep waiting until we get some proper good news?"

"Do we have a choice?" Morgue said.

"We could always run away and let Ricky conquer the world."

"Fuck that."

"Now now. Don't let Ricky drive you to cursing. He's not worth it."

"I just feel so…_helpless_." Morgue said.

"We're still alive. We can still fight." Scalpel said, patting Morgue on the shoulder.

"Yeah, for like maybe a minute. If the Lord takes us seriously, maybe _seconds_. It's just…"

"To be fair, normally by now the bad guy would have been beaten six or seven times and we'd be home by now. The bastard just won't stop CHEATING." Gauntlet groused.

"And what does that tell you, Rob?" Metatron said.

"That either we're in one of those stupid horror stories where everything turns out to be pointless because the writer doesn't know how to scare worth a damn, or the writer got lost somewhere along the line to the conclusion and doesn't want to admit it."

"Who knows? Me, I just think of how good it will be to get home. Maybe we could even ask for some grey poop along the way. Why anyone would ever want poop of any color, the commercial never told me. Also Ryce promised me moonbread donuts." Metatron said.

"It's PouPON, Met. Grey _Poupon_. It's a kind of fancy mustard." Savior said.

"Why's it fancy?"

"They use white wine when making it." Savior said off-handedly, his attention more on Raven as she floated in place, eyes closed and legs crossed.

"And you just happen to know this?"

"Yes."

"On purpose?"

Savior just glanced at Metatron before his eyes glided across the room, stopping briefly on Cyborg. He debated asking the question that was probably on more minds than just his own. _So, the Lord has access to supposedly unlimited power…so what's Starfire's limit and how quickly is she reaching it?_

_Do you really want an answer?_

No, he didn't.

So he just watched, looking at Raven and Robin, and wondering if their wings contained wax that was due to melt.

* * *

"…You never offered to make me cronuts."

"I don't love you."

"Pfft…That s'a lie."

Ryce tensed and gripped the counter under her fevered head. Her stomach twisted and turned. With great effort she kept the heaving urge down, focusing on Metatron and letting his humor keep her head above water. It was easier than admitting the sick fuck next to her was right.

* * *

When you had enemies like Poison Ivy, your mind picked up the strangest facts. One, for Robin, was that hedge mazes were traditionally created with the _buxus _genus, a subset of plants that incorporated about seventy different species and whose wood was good for carving.

The plants that composed the maze Robin had found himself in were not from that genus. Hell, they didn't look like any kind of plant you'd find on this world, or any other. What made it worse was it wasn't completely alien; in several ways the overgrown leaves and vines resembled just that. But there were other details, shapes and textures that better fit something attached to a cephalopod, or perhaps a cross section of a cancer-riddled organ. Even the color was wrong; here and there, the foliage was green, but mostly it was various muted shades of dark brown, and not the brown of an organism in decline. Age was tragic, but it was natural. There was nothing natural about this color; it spoke of parasites and living beings turned against their very selves, unable to do anything but what the plague desired.

Robin didn't remember landing. He remembered the darkness grasping at him, and then he was here. Robin looked up. The 'plague foliage' came to a clear end about five feet above his head, easy enough to climb, but Robin was pretty sure trying to climb would get him nowhere, especially since he wasn't quite sure what was above him. It might have been the equivalent of a starless night sky, or it might have been nothing in and of itself. He filed it away as a last resort.

The ground beneath his feet seemed to be black dirt. The hedge maze walls stretched on either end of him. Robin's mind began making connections. _A maze. Simple denotation is that someone doesn't want something to be found. If this corruption is the Lord, it suggests he built on Marissa's own fears and issues to hide his work, keep it from being damaged…_

The hiss caught Robin's ear. It was coming from above him.

The black cat looked like no feline Robin knew. It seemed less a cat as a feline-esque monkey, its flesh withdrawn away from the cruel talons on its hands and its mouth filled with sharp teeth too big for it. It padded along the top of the maze, letting out growling yowls towards Robin.

Yowls that began sounding behind him as well. Robin flicked his eyes backwards, not surprised to find more of the strange black cats there. _So. Defences or trauma?_

Not like it mattered. Robin remembered Raven's warning. Going on the offence would be a bad idea. For now, Robin began heading forward, sliding around a corner. There were tricks to solving a maze, but Robin had a feeling following a wall or counting intersections would not help her. For all he knew, he was heading AWAY from whatever the maze led to…

Directly into a dead end. Not a wall of plague foliage either. The maze just STOPPED, as did the ground, breaking off into a black, lightless void that Robin's eyes couldn't penetrate. He stopped, as his initial options came to him. Toss a rock into the void to see what he heard. Check at the broken base for handholds to climb down. Take a leap of faith.

Robin dismissed them all, turning around to the sound of more yowling and hisses. The black cats had pinned him down, and were approaching at a steady pace, eyes glinting with hostility. No way to escape. No way to fight back.

_You're stable, Robin. You have good intentions. So how do you save a girl without getting yourself killed?_

The cats leapt.

Robin let them, feeling their bodies slam into him, their claws digging into his flesh, one set of teeth sinking into his skull, the impact of their bodies pushing him backwards, the momentum carrying him into dark oblivion.

Then he was standing again. The cats were gone. His body ached, but a quick examination found no actual wounds on his person. Outside of that, it was like they'd never been there at all.

_You're stable. You want to help. It's all you need, Robin._

"Then I need to find the right way." Robin said, and began walking. Some might have said he started taking turns at random, but in truth, there was no point in trying to puzzle out 'the proper' path. He wanted to be somewhere, and trying to treat this maze like it was an actual maze would just play into 'its hands'.

_Around and around and around I go…where I stop…_

Was at the next turn, which is where Robin saw the figure scamper around the corner.

"…Hello?" Robin said, breaking into a jog to follow. In a different timeline, Robin might have recalled another journey into a dark place, pursuing a familiar form of a friend. Here, Robin just stayed alert, turning around another corner and finding the maze entering into an open area.

The howls reached his ears then. Not feline. Not like anything on Earth. Robin picked up his pace even more, bursting into the clearing.

The first thing he saw were the statues, all over the place and designed like a man had reduced metal to liquid, forced it into a humanoid shape, and then frozen it on the spot. The next thing was him noting the ground was sticky, and Robin looked down to find himself ankle deep in blood.

The last thing he saw were the spirits, twisting masses of hot red smoke that sprouted hands and mouths in a chaotic, undefined mess, menacing the several girls who cowered before them, helpless and terrified, unable to even look at her attackers. It was hard to read the pose of such entities: Robin couldn't tell if they would just keep menacing the girls or move on to outright attacking them.

Normally, Robin would have immediately attacked, or deferred to Raven, who he knew was still watching. Lacking those options, he instead moved forward. He didn't know where the form that had caught his attention had gone to, but she'd ceased to be important. The Lord had let his own oversights bring pain to others once more, and any solution the Titans or he would attempt if they let it run its course would never be sufficient. The damage had to fixed at its source.

But how did one fight for someone when one could not fight?

Robin needed an answer. The fact that the snarling, shrieking ghosts, echoes of the damned spirit's the Lord had sealed in his basement and that had torn into Marissa's brain like the most rabid of dogs, had finally noticed him meant he needed it all the sooner.

Robin had a feeling he wouldn't be able to just ignore these creatures if they tried to rip him apart.

_**What can you do, hero?**_

The Lord was not actually speaking to him, in person or in the infection and damage he'd left on Marissa's mind. The words came from within Robin, that ever-niggling self-doubt, the fear…

Fear.

Then the ghosts were on him, and the voice went quiet.

* * *

One needed the most observant eyes to note how Robin, kneeling on the ground, eyes closed, head bowed, breathing slow, had tensed up, just a bit. That, or mechanical ones.

If you'd asked Cyborg…what was it, eight years ago? Nine maybe? The time before he'd been changed. If you'd asked him why Batman deserved to be on the Justice League, Cyborg wouldn't have been able to give you an answer. It wasn't the fact he was human either; it was moreso the man's noted lack of social skills. If he'd had the awareness he had back then, he might have been wary letting one of Batman's 'child sidekicks' hang around; who knew how badly THEY'D be screwed up?

The reality answered both his questions. Batman got to be on the Justice League because he was without peer at solving problems, including the ones of his own self he couldn't change. His children, for the most part, combined his best aspects without his flaws: Nightwing might have been the most trusted superhero in the world, and Tim…without Tim, Cyborg was certain he and everyone else who'd ever called themselves a Titan would be dead ten times over. There was no better problem solver among them; Tim may have tripped and fell at times, but he always pulled himself back up.

He took it more personally than them too. No wonder he put his neck on the line for Marissa, who Cyborg honestly would have considered a lost cause. All the Titans had lost family they cared about, but none of them had ever been in a position to change that fact. Gar felt guilt over being unable to save his parents, but in truth his child self could barely use his powers and might very well have gotten himself killed along with them. Cyborg could have saved his dad, but he'd been a different person then, angry and lacking good judgment. The choices he'd made had maybe had a hand in his father's end, but they'd saved thousands of other lives, and Victor knew his dad would have preferred it that way. Starfire, Terra, Scalpel, Morgue, Savior, Raven…none of them had really been in any position to save those they'd lost. Even Metatron, from what Cyborg could recall, was in no position to save his sister, his young mind expertly manipulated by a master puppeteer. Only Gauntlet still had both living parents, and the young man was so obsessed with superhero happenstance that he probably had half a dozen plans in the back of his head if anyone tried something against them.

Tim…he'd been put in a harder position than any of them. He'd been speaking to his dad during the very moments of his murder, and he'd done everything he could to try and save him. But he'd just been too far away. He was literally seconds too late. Every single choice of that day had haunted Tim for months, and in some ways, had never stopped.. So close…yet so far.

He would save her. He'd do everything in his power to do it.

Just like Starfire.

…and for both, that might simply have not been enough.

* * *

The blasts were oddly blade-shaped, more like her lover's traditional 'rang projectiles that the oval spheres the Titans' Starbolts normally were. They were no less effective though, as they slashed through the Lord's wings at the makeshift ulna-brace, severing the limbs and briefly leaving the Lord in freefall. Starfire promptly removed freedom from the equitation, ramming into the Lord, her whole body alight with emerald energy as she slammed the Lord down into the frozen oceans of Etemenanki again, a gigantic explosion shattering the iced-over waters, the two vanishing into the depths.

A glacier broke in half from below, two forms erupting from the spraying white smoke and frosty air. The Lord hit the ground, immediately and almost calmly rolling to his feet, while Starfire remained in the air.

"…Why stop?" The Lord said. Starfire remained where she was, not answering, green energies arcing off her eyes and hands. "Are you trying to predict my next move? Or perhaps you think if I am presented with the opportunity, I'll start talking again? Now why would you want me to talk?"

The alien remained silent. The Lord snorted, new wings manifesting above his body.

"It hurts, doesn't it?" The Lord said. "Not just in your body. It's hurting your head. That's the problem with your noble types. You tell me I have no idea what to do with power, but in truth you don't have a damn clue what to do with either."

Starfire's fist shattered the ice, the Lord blurring away, his leg arcing up.

"_**WE'LL SEE WHO PAYS THE HIGHER PRICE!"**_

Starfire twisted herself back into an upright position before the darkness closed over her, her moments slowing for half a second, her innate solar aura not potent enough to rip apart the Lord's stasis field this time before he blurred over, slamming her with a dozen blows seemingly at once. No sooner did Starfire turn around then her face met a vicious upward kick, the Lord spinning and kicking her away before blasts of destroying darkness blew her further into the sky. Starfire recovered properly this time, her eyebeams raking across the ground, the Lord dodging away as Starfire immediately returned to earth, trading blasts that exploded around the frozen ocean.

Starfire wound up for something bigger, her piercing ray striking the Lord and driving him backwards before he teleported…directly into Starfire's eager hands, the alien smashing him into the ground, kicking him away from her, firing from her eyes a quarter of a second after the kick, the blast throwing the Lord back upwards before she blurred over, grabbed him by the throat, and detonated another Starbolt at point-blank range. The Lord's wings would have been a broken mess had he been organic, from the way he slammed into and rolled on the ground; he, of course, just immediately regained his bearings.

Starfire promptly stole one of his moves, slamming her hands down into the ice and consuming him in green erupting blasts from below. A form crashed down from the attack, and Starfire pounced on it, only for the shadow to burst into another stasis field.

"Subpar."

The Lord's formed blurred in and re-appeared behind Starfire, titanic impacts slamming into her from every angle as he raised one hand.

"_**SUPERB."**_

Explosions blasted across Starfire's body from where the Lord had struck, sending her smashing through another wall of ice before she crashed down onto the black beaches of _La Voix._

"You think I haven't figured out what you're doing, alien?" The Lord said, re-appearing in the air above Starfire, manifesting a new sword. "You think it makes any DIFFERENCE?"

The Lord slashed down.

Starfire regained her feet in time.

She did not block in time.

Mainly because she took one step forward instead, the slash glancing off her arm and cutting a superficial wound on her arm, Starfire reaching up a hand and letting the Lord's own momentum carrying him into it, her fingers seizing onto his face as she smashed him into the ground, his sword flying out of his hands and impaling into a nearby rock. The pillar of destroying solar energy pierced up through the clouds, briefly blinding all the Titans still in Etemenanki, the blast so strong that even Starfire seemed to be driven back.

She tried to keep her breathing level. To keep the pain off her face. To calm the scratching that had begun at the back of her mind, the old black feeling of bad days gone by that would serve her no good in trying to see tomorrow. There was another pregnant pause.

The shadows flowed up, forming into the Lord.

"Try and stop me." He said, and vanished.

It was a poor taunt to make.

The Lord re-appeared in front of the shattered wall the Titans were looking out of only to find Starfire had beaten him there. Neither the Titans or the Lord even had a chance to react, Starfire meeting the Lord with a punch of such staggering force it knocked most of the Titans off their feet, the air roaring with the force of the blow and the latest sonic boom Starfire had caused finally reaching the Titans' ears. The Lord almost seemed to vanish over the horizon, his form disappearing beyond the icy lands his demonstration of power had caused. Starfire did not even spare a glance backwards as she took off after the Lord, another sonic boom crashing into the room as she left.

* * *

"…did she figure out a way to channel the Speed Force?" Morgue said.

"What?" Terra said, rubbing at her ears.

"Damn. Star's always had resistance to friction, but…damn." Cyborg said, both thinking out loud and answering Sophie's question.

"WHAT?"

"…This is a good thing, right? We're not going to have a last second twist and have the final boss be corrupted Starfire, right? No one's that cruel…right?" Gauntlet said.

"WHAT? Starfire is boss? Yes, I agree!"

Savior said nothing. He didn't want to. It was the elephant in the room. The Lord had stopped attacking her and gone for them. The clock had just started ticking down, and no one knew when it was going to run out. Savior looked at Raven, and then back out onto the destroyed landscape of La Voix. _Come on Star. You can do it. His desire to win can't hold a candle to yours._

* * *

The Lord was, unfortunately, not a candle person, emerging from the waters of the edge of the ice-wastes and grabbing Starfire's fist when she tried to knock him out further.

"You should hear them. Such absolute faith." The Lord sneered. "The surest way to corrupt a youth is to instruct him to hold in higher esteem those who think alike than those who think differently."

Starfire's response was to twist her hands, switch the grip so that she was holding the Lord's arm instead of vice-versa, and then rip it off. The Lord would have mocked her with an 'Ow', except she didn't give him the chance.

"JUST! SHUT! UP!" Starfire yelled, literally beating the Lord with his own arm. "YOUR WORDS MEAN NOTHING! YOUR EYES SHOW NOTHING! JUST FALL SILENT AND DIE!" Starfire's eyes blazed, slicing the Lord in half before she punched him in the face, his upper half flying backwards before both exploding into black, vanishing feathers, the Lord reforming yet again some distance away, making a show of reforming the limb Starfire had relieved him of and had dropped just after her punch.

"Ahhhhh…there we go." The Lord said. "You blinked."

"It doesn't matter. YOU WON'T HAVE THEM."

"You can't stop me."

"YOU WILL HAVE TO BURN ME DOWN TO NOTHING."

The Lord's foot impacted on Starfire's armguards, the Lord blurring away and thrusting out his hand. Bladed 'prism-snowflakes' began to burst into the air around Starfire, the alien weaving around their expanding, stabbing blades before going for the Lord again. He blurred backwards, Starfire dodging around his arcing blasts and getting ahead of him, stopping on a dime and ramming into him to smash him into the ground again.

"_**AS YOU WISH."**_

Starfire became aware of the impact sites of the Lord's blasts that had just missed her. Missed her on purpose. Having hit the ground, they'd forced the stone upward…into a fixed shape, runes written on the round pillars that glowed brightly, the Lord blurred away and holding out his hand.

The sword she'd knocked away flew back into it. The sword with her blood on it, that the Lord seized on, the chain-like tendrils exploding from the pillars and engulfing Starfire, pinning her down as the Lord pulled her blood from the blade.

"_**BURN."**_

The eruption of black fire blasted Starfire up. At the same time, the hand descended from the clouds, smashing into Starfire in a giant fist that exploded, the detonation shaking the sky.

"Not good enough." The Lord said, and blurred back towards Etemenanki.

Starfire smashed into him halfway there. The Lord was so astonished he couldn't even raise a defence, the alien hammering him through two pillars of rock before she flew back up into the sky.

"NOT GOOD ENOUGH." The burned, raging, blazing alien echoed, and promptly blasted the Lord into the ground with eye beams.

* * *

Raven had expected it. It didn't help.

_Tick tock, tick tock. You don't seem to be getting anywhere. Tick tock, tick tock. Time's running out, and if this doesn't work…_

She couldn't let it distract her.

Not the fear and worry from her friends. Not the pain and worse that roiled within Starfire. Not her own doubts and fears. She'd been taught most of her life how to keep it together, keep it under control, and she couldn't falter now when she needed it most. She'd overcome her father, she'd overcome her brothers, she'd overcome her worst fears, she'd overcome everything that had ever put itself in front of her. Damned if she would fail now.

Then again…that didn't mean she'd succeed.

When it came right down to it, she wasn't sure what a dimension like the _Locus _would respond to. She claimed it was neutral, but ascribing a morality to it might have been the wrong way to consider it. If all that mattered to it was the willpower of the tapper, Raven had a sickening doubt that even her most intense, sincere desire wouldn't be able to outpace the Lord's lunatic need.

He knew.

He knew what she was trying to do. He'd tried to come over and stop her. They were dangling on the razor edge of the Lord's broken mind, his need to kill and harm crashing up against his need to win. If the Lord truly thought Raven was on the verge of winning…

NO. None of that mattered. The Titans would stop him, at any cost. Only she could close the rift, she had to do that. If he came for her, for them…they'd stop him. They wouldn't stop.

It was up to them.

Just like only Robin could save Marissa now. He wouldn't falter. None of them would and neither would she.

She floated there, her mirror before her, her vision adrift among multiple planes of perception at once. Trying to save the world.

_Who's going to die?_

No one on HER watch.

* * *

How do you fight the dead? How do you fight pain itself?

The crazed spirits, or the destructive echoes they'd left of themselves in Marissa's mind, came onto Robin like a pack of wild dogs. No posturing or hesitating here. They saw what Robin was and deemed that he had to be destroyed. And he couldn't raise a hand to fight back. Defend himself? Even if he could, what good would it do? It'd be trading one terror for another, for what else would something that could strike down ghosts be…

…But a terror?

_Criminals are a superstitious, cowardly lot._

Such were the words of Robin's father. The words, however, spoke of the far more complicated needs for a man who dressed up as a bat to be seen as fearsome instead of comedic…and ultimately their grand solution. Criminals, villains, monsters of all stripes, they all believed that they had discarded fear. That fear held no council in their soul. To bring the fear to the most vile was the ultimate weapon you could raise against them, a weapon that worked against any foe. Even the craziest. Even the most wicked. Even the most damaged and disturbed.

_I will become a bat._

_So will I._

They were trying to tear him apart. Robin didn't struggle. Didn't fight.

The worst fears came from the worst things, and sometimes those things were the last thing you'd expect.

"…I am sorry for what happened to you." Robin rasped out through clenched teeth. The spiritual abominations shrieked in his face, Robin feeling hands grasp his throat, head, and spine. "This probably means nothing. So I will just speak fact. You're letting them win."

More howls. A crushing grip. Robin took it.

"THE PEOPLE WHO HURT YOU ARE GONE. DEAD AND GONE. I'm sorry you can never revenge yourself on them, BUT THAT IS HOW IT IS. By staying here, by giving yourself entirely to rage and hate, you are letting them win EVEN NOW. They are STILL working their sick wills on you. Making you into THIS. Letting you keep them from whatever compensation lies beyond. Hurting me, hurting her, changes NOTHING. And if you want to tell me that none of it matters any more save doing onto others than was done onto you, then you're WORSE than them. And to hell with you."

The shrieks seemed like they were going to drive Robin's eyes right out the back of his skull.

"You heard me. TO HELL WITH YOU!"

The spirits ripped themselves from Robin, tearing themselves apart with a final agonized cry. Whether Robin had made them see the truth or just broken their grasp on Marissa's mind with his nature, Robin didn't know. He was already moving onto the next problem.

"…Marissa." Robin said, stepping away from where the ghosts had tried to destroy him. With them gone, he finally saw the mental avatars.

His stomach lurched. From what little experience he'd had with Raven's mind-dimension mirror, the mental clones that represented aspects of a person were whole. Even a lunatic's mind would theoretically have all its many, many shards of glass of a personality represented as whole people…but not here. Faces missing eyes looked at Robin, legs tried to stand on obviously broken ankles, and mangled arms that didn't shed a drop of blood gestured towards Robin. Fearful. Unchanging.

"Please…leave me alone." One said, her color a dull off-purple.

"Stop hurting us."

"What did we do to you?"

"You can't help us." A darkly coloured Marissa with a mauled face said. "They hate us."

"We killed their children. They don't care about anything else. They want our blood. They want us dead."

"You would throw us in a cage."

"You would have forgotten us had he not saved us." The dark-coloured one said. "He helped us. He gave us a place. You won't."

"You can't." A green-coloured one with a caved in skull and several missing fingers said. "It's not what you do."

"You hate us. We tried to kill you. Would have, if we could have. Leave us alone."

The Marissas seemed to be massing around Robin. First cats, then ghosts, now the ruins of this young woman's mind. It wasn't aggressive like the first two, though. It seemed to in pained confusion, like Robin was a noise they just wanted to drown out.

This time, Robin reached up…to his own face.

"What you did…it's not your fault. And if you honestly believe it is…I forgive you."

"…you lie!"

"You want to trick us!"

"Take us away from him! The only one who ever tried to help us…!"

"He didn't hurt us…this is what we needed…isn't it?"

"…my name is Timothy. Timothy Drake." Robin said, removing his mask. He cast it on the ground, and for added weight, ripped off his Robin insignia. "I chose this life because I wanted to try and save the world. There is no greater weight on me in knowing those I failed. But every time I get a second chance…I never make the same mistake twice."

"It doesn't matter…"

"Your ways would have us rot…"

"Your world WILL NEVER accept us!"

"We just want to be left alone…it's all we ever wanted…"

"We never wanted anything else…"

"…Neither do I." Robin said. "I…wish I could promise you something, but…I've learned the world holds no promises. All you can do is try. I just ask…if he was better than me, then, now…why are you still in pain?"

"That's irrelevant…"

"The master has more important tasks…"

"Why won't you listen? Listen to someone else…?"

"He fixed us…he never asked for anything…"

"Just for you to build him things. And follow his desires. Including our death." Robin said.

"More than you can offer…"

"They hate us…"

"HE hates us…"

The world was starting to lose focus, and Robin knew it wasn't due to anything on his part. He was losing her.

"…I don't hate you." Robin said.

"Liar…"

"Just leave…"

"…no." Robin said. "Not until I've done what I've failed to do. I won't give up. On this, or you. If I could go back to that day and take the bullet for you instead…I would.

"If you don't believe me…then tell me to go. A liar has no place here."

Silence.

Then the fear bloomed.

Robin knew immediately it wasn't caused by him. That fact didn't give him any comfort; he'd forced away the Lord-traces and ghost-echoes, what else could there be? Robin could only turn to look.

At first, he thought it was the same form he'd seen briefly earlier.

Then he couldn't tell WHAT it was.

They were running. Robin could only snap his head back and forth as all the mental echoes panicked and fled, fleeing into the maze behind him. Robin snapped his head back to the shape. Now it was more distinct. Huge, towering over him. A smell that Robin could only describe as 'rotting swamp' washed over him.

Robin wouldn't have run away normally, and he damn sure wasn't going to start now. That was not the problem.

It was the fact that the ground started to get soft around his feet. Looking down, he saw himself beginning to sink. Robin stared at the sight, wondering what to do. He couldn't 'stand his ground', that was the problem here. He couldn't yell at the ground, or at the approaching form, that wouldn't work either. But just vanishing beneath the blood…that was also a bad idea, he could tell.

The growl reached his ears. A strangled, rasping sound, like the maker was emitting the noise through a potent throat injury. Getting closer, the form was taking on more defined traits. While the Marissas had been injured, this figure seemed more outright malformed, like it had never had anything resembling a normal appearance. It seemed to have three arms, or maybe two and a third, badly misplaced and twisted leg. Horns sprouted from its misshapen head, a second mouth opening and closing in its chest, the blood hissing wherever its feet trod. A nightmare minotaur, sent to chase the hero through the labyrinth.

No ball of string.

No sword to strike it down.

No way out.

…So what WAS it, then? What was it doing there?

That, in the end, was the simple answer. Robin had to know, and so he pulled his right foot from the muck that was trying to absorb him and set it in front of him, the ground suddenly as solid as a rock. Robin pulled his other foot free and walked towards it.

"Why are you here?"

The form evaporated like it had never been, and Robin realized just what it was even before it spoke.

"He can't touch me." The Marissa said. It was the sole intact one, a quiet yellow color, undamaged in any way. Robin really wished he could give it another name. Innocent. Heart. Something kind. But he had enough dealing with lunatics to know how brains worked…and just what someone like the Lord would have to leave untouched.

"You're the memory."

"All memory." Memory Marissa said. "I…remember everything. All of it. Everything."

"…If he damaged you, he'd damage Marissa's ability to build things. But…"

"The others can't bear me. They couldn't back when I was broken, yet whole…and now they simply can't. He stole that capacity in trying to fix me. If they grasped what I was…everything would break down. Like a machine stripped of its gears, running at its most basic settings, thrown into overdrive."

"…So he cloaks you in horror. So they run. And so he gets his way."

"…they're right, you know." Memory said. "You can't save us."

"I…"

"I killed all those people. What are you going to do, lie and say the Lord was manipulating me even then? Shove all the blame on his shoulders? Can you do that, Robin? Can you deny those who died justice?"

"…I…" Robin said, raising a hand, his fingers clenching in frustration.

"You tried. You did everything you could. You and Raven. I know. I'll always know. Thank you." Memory said. "But it's too late. It was too late before you even knew I existed. You should devote your energies to stopping the Lord."

"…Once…I was too slow." Robin said, closing his eyes and remembering. Kneeling there. Ribs shattered. Every breath burning agony. Seeing a damaged woman in even greater agony put a gun to her head, wanting to try and grab for something, anything, that would stop her, but too slow, too weak, a useless burden who got someone killed.

And he remembered running. Running and running until his lungs burned even harder. Trying to will himself to run even harder. Too slow. Too weak. Another corpse lay before him, his life's blood leaking onto the floor, his father dead. In the end, a useless burden who got someone killed.

"…Twice…is unacceptable." Robin said. "I've done many things, failed in many things…but I never, ever, try to repeat the lessons of history."

"What can you do, though?" Memory said. The area around her, as they'd spoken, had gotten worse and worse. More rotten. More dark. More and more of the same disease Robin had seen infecting the maze. Robin, for a moment, just wanted to scream. Scream at what the Lord had done. Scream at how he'd taken a girl so badly hurt and made her into her own worst enemy for his own desires. And called it helping. Called it…helping…

Robin looked down. The rot wasn't going near him. Heck, it almost seemed like where he was standing was looking better than it was a minute ago.

"…If I can do this…not be destroyed by his touch, or those ghosts, if I can see through his curse…then I can do SOMETHING. I can, Raven can…there MUST be a way. People can be terrible…but if that's all they could ever be…then I wouldn't be here. In every way."

Robin looked down, and then, in the logic of dreams, put his mask and letter back on.

"That's why I have to stop him. In everything. Because that's what HE'S chosen to be."

"…I remember…better days. Back before everything good…went away. Back before I knew…just how far down the rabbit hole things went." Memory said. "I…remember…"

"So do I." Robin said. "There's more to life than the dark."

* * *

Focus. Calm against his madness, sincerity against his hypocrisy…

Don't try to outpace him…let him burn himself out…

You are on the side of the angels…

You are stronger than him…

Raven kept her gaze level…

And the eye of the beholder began to shift.

* * *

"…I think it's closing. Yes! It's closing! Thank you, thank you, I will never complain about spring cleaning again! Because I'm actually going to make it there!" Gauntlet said. Savior tried to keep the grimace off his face.

"Guys, don't look at it." Cyborg said. "A watched pot never boils and this is when we need to be focussed most."

"I swear, if it just ENDS…I won't complain if the Lord ends up a human being and we have to send him to jail. I just want it to END." Terra said. Savior tried to calm his nerves. Tried not to let the thought come to him.

So he looked at Metatron.

"Is it over?"

Metatron's face was…unreadable. He might have stopped even before Gauntlet spoke.

"…not…until…" Metatron said. "…Oh dear."

* * *

The Lord's wings flared, the appendages firing off blades of energy in twin with his hands, the dark edges expanding until they were hundreds of feet long. Starfire dodged through them, flying upward past the Lord into the clouds. Trying to locate her, he fired more blasts, the explosions ripping through the swirling, coal-black depths, lightning striking La Voix several times as if in anger. The Lord snapped his eyes down towards Etemenanki.

"Now…"

"No." Starfire said, directly in front of him.

"HOW DO-?"

Her fist tore straight through the Lord's back, the impact throwing him across the sky, Starfire meeting him from behind with an upward axe handle, and then blazing in front of him again, her right hand shining. She brought it down on the Lord's face, the downward blow driving the Lord back down into La Voix. A two-mile portion of the island literally rose out of the ground, Starfire's impact and the Lord's previous cuts causing the stone body of the island to act like a piece of cut cake, the stone chunk rising up in the air nearly three hundred feet before crashing back down, Starfire jumping off from the impact, blood running down her arm.

It took the Lord, even as he was, several seconds to regather himself, and he was not happy.

"You are DYING." The Lord said. "The power is tearing you apart from within, mind AND body. Why won't you BREAK? Why do you keep OPPOSING ME?"

"…Because I do." Starfire said, spitting out a wad of blood. "I will oppose you until hell freezes over, and then I will OPPOSE YOU ON THE ICE."

"You…insignificant…"

The Lord's blurring, arcing blow, trying to get around Starfire's guard, impacted on her wrists again, Starfire lashing her leg up and kicking the Lord into the sky.

"You know, I'm thinking maybe we don't have to worry about destroying this tower. Because I'm frankly amazed the whole ISLAND hasn't sunk by now." Gauntlet said. "I don't know if the real estate here would be cheap or expensive, but damn if it isn't something!"

"The earth's a tough cookie. Just like Star. It'll take it." Terra said. "…This IS good, right? This is what Raven wanted to do? We're not sitting around fiddling while Rome burns, right?"

"That's a myth. The fiddle wasn't even invented then." Savior said.

"NO ONE CARES, NOEL. OOPS, USING REAL NAMES IN THE FIELD! SILLY ME!" Terra said. "I just want some answers."

"Ye, though I walk in the valley of the shadow of death, I shall fear no evil." Beast Boy mused. "For I am the baddest mamba-jamba in the valley, and am driving a house-sized mass of 'fuck you'."

"…I think the phrase you were coining got a little away from you there…Gar…" Savior said, still looking at Metatron. Standing there. Not talking. Not adding to the banter. Savior didn't want to speak. To put it to words. He did it anyway.

"Adam?"

It was the strangest mirror. Despite the Lord's claims to Starfire, it seemed like it was him who was unravelling. It didn't affect his power, the shadow god focussing a blast between his hands before he fired it off. Starfire mirrored him, and the green and black beams smashed into each other and turned the air around them into a whirling mass of devastated ground and ice.

"Even now! After all this, you refuse to understand!" The Lord said, his claim that everything had already been said having seemingly been tossed away. "You cling to your friendships, your MORALS, like it gives you answers…how many answers have your friends given you to your greatest torments, alien? And morality? Morality is the best of all devices for leading mankind by the…"

Starfire's hand seized onto the Lord's face, ripping his jaw off before her hand caved in her skull.

"You make noise. Endless, buzzing noise. Like a fly. I normally would not swat a fly. That says all that I need to say." Starfire said, and kicked the Lord backwards before she blew him up with a Starbolt. Piercing blades lanced from the explosion, Starfire flying around them and into the ground, emerging with the Lord's form…

As he grabbed at her head.

"_**YOU WILL LISTEN TO M-!"**_

Starfire blew the Lord's face off before he could put her in another hypnotic trance and start rambling.

She realized her error when she felt the cold length of the blade stab into her stomach. Misdirection.

"Sorry, Titan." The Lord said, and hammered Starfire into the clouds with a punch. Lightning arced, slamming into the alien, but she barely seemed to notice as she turned to meet the Lord, the dark god smashing into her. Her fist smashed into his face. His smashed into her wound, the pain doing enough to floor her and let his poisonous grip seize her by the head.

"In reality, I understand. I say those words to comfort me. Because in the end, I will never divorce you of the idea that you have greater purpose!" The Lord snarled. "So here's some proper, _**LAST **_words for you, Titan. _**GO TO HELL!**_"

Starfire's eyebeams burned through the Lord's hand, but further tendrils from his arm and cloaked seized onto the alien as he plummeted down.

Down towards the volcano. Down through the choking plume of poisonous ash and gas. The crater and vent shattered as the Lord hammered the alien down through the conduit, all the way down…to the molten red blood of the earth itself.

The Lord slammed Starfire right through the blazing liquid, the alien vanishing beneath the surface, the Lord driving her through the viscous, incinerating rock, down and down and down. Burying her like the future she represented, that he so loathed. His eyes blazed even brighter than hers.

"_**I'LL EVEN FREEZE IT."**_

The upwards blast of absorbed and re-directed heat pierced not only the clouds, but the atmosphere of the planet itself, the Lord instantaneously flash-setting several cubic miles of rock, locking the Titan in a tomb of the Earth itself. His feet settled down on the now-black rock, his wings snapping, several last remnants of heat venting from his body.

"…Mankind would rather have the void as its purpose…than be void of purpose." The Lord said, and twisted onto himself, vanishing with one last hiss more akin to rage than fire.

* * *

It was then Metatron spoke.

"We're in trouble."

* * *

Raven felt it, and her heart seemed to stop.

"NO."

* * *

Robin could sense them. Peering out from the maze. Still terrified…but at the same time, wondering why the monster hadn't just smashed or eaten Robin and continued on. It was a start…anything could come from a start…

Then the rumbling started, and it all came crashing down.

Robin knew the shaking wasn't supposed to happen. He knew this because it unsettled him…and when the rock was unsettled, that meant nothing good.

"…he's coming." Memory said.

"No." Robin said, holding out his hand. "We can fight this, we can stand together…"

"I'm sorry Robin." Memory said,

"I'll fight for you! Like I should have! I will! Together!" Robin said.

"_**No. You won't."**_

The black sky shattered, and the maze abruptly was torn out of the ground, flying upwards into a yawning abyss. Robin lunged for Memory, but he was too slow. The wind carried her away.

Even as it carried him away. That's all this way, in the end. A show of power. The most violent expulsion a hateful mind could muster.

He yelled in fury, a rage he didn't think was possible, but it meant nothing. Nothing against the blackness that was crashing down on him, on him and the girls, some screaming…some reaching for Robin…some crying for help.

"_**GET. OUT."**_

* * *

"What's going on? Where's Starfire? Where's the Lord?" Beast Boy said.

"Titans, alert! Be ready for anything!" Cyborg said. Savior snapped his head around, his eyes falling onto Raven.

And he knew.

"Oh…you bastard. You BASTARD."

* * *

Raven turned to her mirror as the hand ripped from within it, seizing her by the throat. God, why hadn't she seen the possibility that was now literally searing its way into her flesh?

"_**You IDIOT. You still think you can win? You try and defile my work? YOU DARE?"**_ The Lord thundered, ripping his way free from the mirror, the altered reality Raven had been functioning it beginning to twist and distort. Despair clawed at Raven; it had all gone wrong. The Lord hadn't gone for a frontal assault for his last attempt. He'd taken a back door, slipping into Marissa's mind, the mind he had done so much damage to, and through there into her mirror, tossing Robin aside like he was nothing as he punched his way out.

It wasn't just despair though.

It was rage, and there wasn't a hand in existence that could choke it out of her.

"I dare? I? _YOU _DARE?" Raven spat back into the Lord's face. "YOU DESTROYED HER! YOU BROKE HER WORSE THAN ANY OF THE HUMANS YOU HATE SO MUCH COULD! YOUR WORK? TO HELL WITH YOUR WORK! AND YOU!"

"_**And what do you offer her? Hope? I WON'T LET HER STARVE." **_The Lord said. _**"Be GONE, Blackbird. This is MY world. You have no place here. I told you already, and you will listen. I. WI-"**_

"NO." Raven said, thrusting out her hand. The mirror flew into it, the last resort she'd pondered and dismissed and was now bringing to bear. The mirror was cracked, it was damaged, but it was the truth, and against this bastard buried in endless lies, Raven couldn't think of any better usage. She'd throw the cruellest thing she could back into his face: his delusion, his hypocrisy, his never-ending claim that he was the real hero in all these terrible events he'd machinated. She'd turned all his efforts to break him back on him and crack his head like an egg.

AND GOD DAMN ANY AND ALL CONSEQUENCES.

"_**WHAT?"**_

"SEE WHAT YOU ARE. COME THROUGH THE LOOKING GLASS. FALL DOWN THE RABBIT HOLE WITH ME."

"_**NO!"**_

"YES!" Raven screamed, holding the truth. "I DEMAND THE TRUTH OF IT ALL-!"

"_**NO!"**_

And…something happened. The barest glimpse of…

"_**NOOOOOOOOOO!" **_The Lord bellowed. It wasn't a howl of fear though, but the same all-consuming rage that had nearly killed the Titans once before. The same kind Raven had felt…except even more potent.

In it, Raven realized she'd had a weapon even more devastating than she'd thought. Whatever she'd tried to call up was the worst truth the Lord had within him. But it was not the magic bullet.

It was throwing gasoline on a fire.

"_**NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" **_

In the end, Raven found herself horribly, terribly right.

At her best, she couldn't stand up to his worst.

* * *

The Titans never knew what happened.

One moment everything was the same. They were ready.

The next Robin was jerking to his feet with a gasp.

The next, Raven was flying backwards with a scream, an erupting of black and white power throwing all the Titans off their feet as well. A howl pierced their ears, one that ended seemingly as soon as it began.

Raven's mirror tumbled to the ground.

The Lord's foot slammed down on top of it a second later, shattering it to pieces and grinding them into the dirt.

"…no…damn it, no…" Robin said. So close…so close.

"How tragic." The Lord said. "To be…or not to be. Not to be, Titan. Not close enough. That's your way. Never close enough. Perhaps this time, you will finally listen." The Lord said. "I. WIN. YOU'VE. LOST."

"No-!" Raven said, rolling onto her knees.

"Yes, blackbird. This game is done. You've used up all your surprises, and I've used up all my patience."

"…LIKE HELL." Robin said, getting up and pointing. "TITANS, GO!"

"Straight there." The Lord said, and with a wave of his hand he smashed all the Titans off their feet again as they tried to get up.

After a second, they all started struggling to get up again. The Lord did not attack again, his eyes dark and cold.

"God…you really won't surrender, will you? You absolutely refuse to see the truth of it. The future was mine LONG before any of you started your stupid game. I've just come around to collect."

"Blah blah blah, blah blah blah, I'd tell you to shut up but you wouldn't listen, so just SHUT IT!" Terra yelled, hurling a blade rock that the Lord knocked aside with an errant gesture.

"So strong…so defiant…so absolute in their certainty. A true mirror. Something…maybe even something I can't waste." The Lord said. "…Perhaps merely remaking you in my image is thinking too small. Maybe you shouldn't be the sole exceptions. Maybe…you should be the template."

For a moment, Raven saw the possibility. Her soul broken and devoured. All their souls. Her friends, her peers, those that came before. Forget the world. If the Lord got that kind of chance, realized that kind of ambition, he could bring the universe under his heel.

"…like hell." Raven echoed.

"…none of us will EVER serve you. Neither will any of them." Robin said.

"My brick will save us," Metatron declared boldly, holding the piece of rock up.

"Oh really, Metestasnathean? Titans? Then why don't you tell them that deep down, you're beginning to think how much further I've gone this time? What it means. Or hell, if you file that under everyone has doubts…your claim, Robin…why didn't you ever tell Noel that? Because I don't think that falls under doubt."

The Titans had no answer to that.

"Precisely. It's like I told him during our first meeting all those lifetimes ago. EVERYONE. BREAKS." The Lord said. "What does not kill them, will indeed make them stronger."

The Titans just responded with yells, every one that was still capable of a projectile firing them at the Lord as the rest charged in. The Lord just teleported away…

Next to Marissa.

"…mas…?" The girl whispered, trying to get up, her eyes cloudy, her tone uncertain. The Lord cut her bonds with a gesture.

"So he spoke to you of better things. Better promises. A better world." The Lord said, Marissa looking up at him."…do you know what the cruellest irony is, Miss Mori? He's right."

Marissa's eyes went wide.

"But it doesn't matter. You'll never remember a word." The Lord said, placing two fingers on Marissa's head in a gesture that was almost tender.

"NO!" Robin screamed, trying to reach the girl. Too slow. Always too slow. The Lord just teleported back to where he'd been standing, arcs of dark energy shooting into the woman's head, the girl staggering back and falling to her knees.

"In regards to your ideals, your desires, your IDIOCY, Titans, your FUTURE, imagine a boot. Stamping on a human face. FOREVER." The Lord said. "_**She loved Big Brother."**_

Marissa rose back up, her eyes dull and blank, black energy crackling on her body and infusing itself into the ferrofluid armor she wore.

"It's OVER. I. WIN. _**THE ABYSS GAZES ALSO." **_The Lord said, and pointed. _**"KILL THEM."**_

In a way, the next fifteen seconds, to Raven, were the Titans' proudest moment. None of them had a stake in Marissa Mori's health and well-being. Most of them thought she was beyond saving, one way or another. They extended her the basic heroic empathy, but sometimes that and a nickel would get you a cup of coffee. And as far as they knew, she had just been lost forever.

Yet as Marissa attacked them, with black swords and ebony-cast metal that sent piercing tendrils and crackling blasts of power everywhere, all the Titans fell over themselves not to hit her, dancing around her blows, or taking them where they could, Marissa knocking down Cyborg, Scalpel, Gauntlet, and Beast Boy in quick succession. Perhaps they thought Robin or Raven would have a plan. Perhaps the Lord figured that too, as Marissa made a beeline for Raven next.

Savior was the one who ultimately made the decision. Raven couldn't blame him. In his shoes, with his mind, she might have done the exact same thing.

Except he was too wounded and tired to pull his punch when the Lord snapped his fingers at the last second, and so Marissa's eyes returned to reality just in time for Savior's fist to crash into her. Savior realized what he'd done half a second before the power in Marissa detonated, a wave of force knocking all the Titans back and down. Marissa collapsed, holding her face.

There was silence.

Then the Lord just…laughed.

"…and so it always goes. As it will always go. Never changing under your hand." The Lord said. "You're all just human. Out of the crooked timber of humanity, _nothing straight has ever been made._ You know why I sometimes call myself the villain? _**BECAUSE I WOULD NEVER HAVE THE GALL TO CALL MYSELF A HERO."**_

The Titans could only stare. Marissa lay on the ground, holding her face, a small sob escaping her.

The sob, Raven felt, made the unfamiliar spark. So unfamiliar it seemed impossible.

Yet the brilliant light flared behind the Lord, lighting Metatron's shadowed, calm features.

"Mistake."

Metatron had become legitimately angry.

The hand of gold blurred towards the Lord's exposed back.

It was caught by one of shadow.

The moment seemed suspended in time: The Lord – no, the shadow construct facing the Titans, standing lifeless at attention, while the Lord himself emerged from its back, like a triumphant tumor, with a smile of pure satisfaction. Metatron, his hand ablaze and captured, with no escape.

In it, it clicked in for Raven. All the Lord's cruelty. All the pain he'd just dealt out. Everything he'd done since Metatron had come back with Savior.

Speed chess.

Misdirection.

Ensuring this result.

"…Yours." The Lord replied.

In Metatron, Raven only saw understanding. "Ah."

She didn't even get a chance to cry out when the Lord slammed his hand into Metatron's chest. The Titan's face didn't change, even as the Lord slammed him into the floor, and with a thundering crash through it, several echoes coming from the new hole as the strange young man went smashing down, down, down.

Until he stopped.

And he stopped. Raven felt his heartbeat seize, and then go quiet. The Lord had literally struck him so hard, he'd induced cardiac arrest.

_Who's going to die?_

Raven had her answer.

…A bleating shriek shuddered through the empath…

She saw...she _**KNEW**_.

Raven's heart broke for her.

For a moment, the Lord remained in the pose he'd finished in, his fist aimed down, his head lowered.

One last, brief laugh, that mirrored Marissa's quiet tears.

"You blinked." The Lord said. "Good night, 'sweet prince.' And the rest…is _silence_."

* * *

…Rorschach…

Dr. Sid occasionally asked her to do it. Blobs of black and white and her own psyche simplified onto a piece of paper.

Rorschach…

She often made up random and disturbing images just to mess with him.

("Zalgo…He comes!"

"Ryce, I asked you to take this seriously."

"I see a goat."

"Come now, Miss Gallagher…")

Rorschach…

When had she fallen to her knees? She wondered, her hands sliding against the white floor, smearing the splattered pudding and cake she had dropped. The perceived symmetry of it ebbed away as she tried so desperately to hold herself up. What did Alaryce see in the ruined confection? What smartass jokes flittered up to her often too-sharp tongue?

Nothing.

Alaryce Gallagher saw nothing

Because Adam Matthews was dead.

"…A-Adam?" someone croaked out in a choked whisper. The desperate pleading in that single name, as if its mere utterance could some how take back the grievous hole in his chest so many miles away. It took her a few ticks of the clock to understand it was not someone who had whispered it, but her.

Eye boring into the chocolate patterns her hands were spreading, she tried to find something in it. What she saw, was that something was pittering and pattering down into the smeared mess, finally bringing the warm trails coursing down her face to her full attention. Crying. She was crying. Why didn't she feel it? Why couldn't she _**feel **_at all? Shouldn't she feel something other than this cool, buzzing numbness? Adam "Metatron" Matthews is her best friend…her everything. Something lowly and scaled, with stupid-cruel eyes hissed a single word out in her mind.

_W__**as**__._

_Adam "Metatron" Matthews __**WAS**__ your best friend._

_Now, he's flesh with a hole in it. _

_A meat donut._

…_isn't that __**funny?**_

"I am sorry, Alaryce."

With a violent jerk, Ryce's eyes ripped up from their desperate attempt to decipher the hidden semiology in spilled confections, or to feel the sting of the tears gathering in them. Absently, a chocolate laden hand roughly wiped away those numb tears, smearing chocolate, blood and saline across her face. That vicious voice within her retreated back. In its place, a dim echo of sitting on the couch and his promise that she would always be his munchkin, never to be left behind rang hollowly.

Azrael frowned down at her, "Get up off the floor."

Adam was falling. Soon, there would be nothing left, and no promise he had ever made could change that.

Soon…

The grin that grew across her face was a sickly, twisted thing, something that bounced back at you from a fun house mirror at best. At worst, something that leered over a ledge through reinforced glass windows in a place like Arkham. She grinned up at her father because if she did not she surely would start to scream. Even if they won, even if the rest somehow came back whole…her family would return home to find her screaming. She would scream and never be able to stop again.

Because of everyone she had lost…everything she had lost? She could not-_**WOULD NOT**_- lose Adam. The dark could not take this. It had taken Robbie and Morgan and Eddie. It would not take ADAM. Not before she said it. It was too soon, surely that was obvious. In a trembling voice she could not recognize as her own began to beg. She swallowed her pride and her dignity and on hand and knee begged.

"…H-He's not…com…pletely gone yet…You c-could take it back. Daddy, we could t-t-take it back together!" her smile… it was starting to hurt, "Please, daddy…"

The Archangel stared down at her, "I said up off the floor. You look foolish."

"Daddy…please…" her voice cracked, it felt like the corners of her lips would split. It was as if she could keep smiling, if she could just make it just a little wider he'd understand. He'd make it stop hurting and help her. Gods help her she was pawing at the hem of his jacket.

Azrael said nothing. He watched her. Just watched her cry and kneel, burn every last shred of dignity she had and grovel for this one thing. Her loyalty and devotion, which looked past every harsh moment. Every cruel word and even the occasional blow. Every negligence and oversight that she excused for the simple fact that she loved her father. And Ryce _**did**_ love him…as sick as she knew it was. All she wanted was this one thing. One last chance at this so she could do it right. Her eyes promised that. Promised that regardless of how this ended she would finally just say it…if he gave her this chance.

He stared.

"…Are you done?"

The words hit her with the force of a train, too rooted in place to even flinch with the impact. The cruelty in those three simple words worth a life time of hiding in trembling fear from her brothers and sisters…worth two life times. The tone was not callous…it was not even cold. It was disinterest. It was boredom. It was indifferent. No amount of snivelling and begging at his feet had changed or ever would change the unfathomable content of those words. No amount of blind love, patience, or humiliation would take back the truth in those three syllables.

Nor could they prevent the mindless rage.

"You…you son of a bitch!" she shrieked, scrambling up to her feet as her grip on it all finally snapped, "You heartless FUCK! After ev'rythin' I've done for YOU! I have given up EV'RYTHIN' time and time again! I have bent and I have broken. ALL FOR YOU!" her voice grinded into a hoarse croak, her throat bled raw, "M'done payin' for Caitlyn! Do you hear me? M' DONE BLEEDIN' FOR YOUR DEAD WIFE, OLD MAN! M'done payin' for your mistakes and your weaknesses and damn you, you are goin' to give me this. Take it back! For once in your god damned existence b'more than the shitty excuse for a father you are! **TAKE. IT. BACK!"**

His hand was gripped, the knuckles white and Ryce knew how badly he wanted to hit her. Part of her wanted it. Azrael stared down his nose at her as one would stranger. A curl of his upper lip and a flash of teeth was all he gave as he shook his head. Disgust. Shame. The look of brothers and sisters as she had scrambled her way through them for fifteen years of abuse. Then, his back was turned and he was heading for the door.

"You are an embarrassment."

Ryce knew then. He had not come for Noel.

He had come for her Adam.

He had sat there and ate cake…all the while knowing that her world was going to fall down on itself. Her father had sat there smiling, conversing, and looking her in the eye without a shred of remorse over the hurt he knew to be coming her way. Her very heart imploded…and he made small talk.

And now? Now, daddy was going to do his job. He was going to sit in his chair before Adam and judg-

…a great Wooden Door began to rattle on his hinges.

"Azrael?"

Something…_else_ had curled into her tone. Not dead for it had never truly been alive. Something that made the archangel pause, though not turn back to her. That otherness to his youngest made him know better. There was dirt in her voice. There was dirt in her voice and he knew what vineyard it had come from.

"If you will not take it back. I will," her tone so calm and even, as if the hysteria shrieking in it moments ago never was. That serenity made his stomach clench, his skin felt like slime. Without a word, the ancient creature shut his eyes and waited, bracing for the floods.

The Office Door cracked open.

…and what poured forth was Barren.

* * *

"…so then. What now then, Titans? Do you see history taking shape before you? Do you rise up in rage to avenge your fellow? The one you barely even know, who most of you doubt was really your peer? If you were cursed to lose someone, was this one not the best? Maybe that doesn't matter, a life is a life? Go ahead then. It's over." The Lord said. "You can't break my connection to the _Locus_. You can't lock me up because there's no prison that can hold me. And even as hard as you try, you can't kill me. _**YOU CAN'T KILL THE NIGHT.**_"

"…we will fight you. All the same." Robin said, getting into a combat pose for what he was pretty sure would be the final time. "To the last, of everything in us."

"I know." The Lord said. "You may have only enemies whom you can hate, not enemies you despise. You must be proud of your enemy: then the successes of your enemy are your successes too. You do yourself proud, Titans. I assure you, you will merely be changing one sense of pride for another."

"Rot in hell, you piece of shit." Savior said.

"No." The Lord said, raising an arm. "For you, Titans. My ultimate blade. The Demiurge. I may never wield it again, and I know I wield it well."

The weapon began to manifest.

The Titans prepared for a true and final stand.

…Etemenanki shook.

Then Etemenanki, for lack of a better word, screamed. The Lord and Raven felt it at the same time.

"NO!"

The explosion mixed with the scream, the fire red and green and white as Starfire smashed upward through the floor and into the room.

"LIKE. HELLLLLLLLLL!" The alien shrieked so loud that Raven nearly went deaf, and then her arms and fists lashed out and the Titans, spurred on by a mental shriek from Raven, were all diving for cover, an inferno of heat and rage and destruction sweeping over the whole chamber. Raven vaguely saw Starfire crash into the Lord before she was forced to throw up whatever she had left as a shield, the room transforming into a furnace, the fire reaching out to devouring everything it touched.

Starfire was alive.

It gave Raven no comfort, as her shield shattered and she was caught, like a leaf on the wind.

* * *

The alien. The thrice-damned alien. Not even burying her alive in ten million tons of rock could keep her down. Even the Lord was surprised he was still standing where he was.

_There are no eternal facts, as there are no absolute truths. _Perhaps, for his most esteemed foes, that applied to death as well.

He'd managed to deflect the alien when she'd tried to strike him directly, but even then, from the absolutely out of control way she'd blasted her way up into Etemenanki, how had he even managed to stand to do…so…

He…

He hadn't.

It had been the metal on him. The quicksilver liquid that had leapt out to partially cover him, giving him just enough with his new defences against the stars to stand his ground. But…

"…Miss Mori…" The Lord said. He no longer could properly smell, but his other senses picked it up just fine.

She lay at his feet, her outfit shredded and melted, every exposed inch of skin hideously burned, half her hair gone, limp, a broken doll with its strings cut. Her liquid metal armor mindlessly flowed back to her, absent when it was needed most. Absent because…

"…what did you do?" The Lord said. "…Your armor protected me."

Marissa's breathing was so shallow it might not have existed at all.

"I never told you to program that in. I wouldn't, why would I need…protection…why did you…?" The Lord said, staring at the girl. "You…for me?"

The Lord looked a few more seconds, then sighed deeply. Humanity. He'd been quoting Kant earlier, instead of Nietzsche, but those words of his also rang true. Nothing straight came from their nature. Nothing.

"…stupid girl." The Lord said, kneeling down. More work for him. More debt to repay. So be it.

"LORD!" Raven yelled. The sorceress had gotten to her feet as well, again, somehow, and as the Lord looked at her, she saw what had become of Marissa.

Her eyes went as black as her soul-self.

"You bastard. You _**BASTARD**_."

"This was not my choice."

"IT'S YOUR FAULT! YOUR-" Raven yelled, black wings of bladed energy erupting from her body as she flew towards the Lord.

The Lord smacked her aside so hard she felt like her skull had been knocked clean out of her head.

"Shut up. Useless little girl. Useless, ALL OF YOU! USELESS WHEN IT COUNTS!" The Lord said, putting a hand over Marissa. "None of you can save ANYONE, NOT WHEN IT COUNTS! All you do, in the end, is just make things worse! Look at what YOU did, Raven. Look at what you drove your team mates to do!"

"You'll die for this." Raven said, and flew forward again.

Energy erupted from the Lord's hand, driving Raven back and smashing her into the ground, her offence ripped to shreds like paper.

"No. You won't. You've lost." The Lord said, turning back towards Marissa, speaking in the barest whisper. "I will fix this, Miss Mori, but I must settle this first. Go home. I'll finish things there."

The dark power flowed out, settling onto the girl before it consumed her. Within a second she was gone, taken back to Ginnungagap, to safety. The Lord slowly rose, pondering where Marissa had been.

"…It should not have been this way."

The Lord's hand snapped out, blocking the black blast of power from Raven.

"And it has gone on. QUITE. LONG. ENO-"

Raven never saw where Starfire came from. Neither did the Lord, as she smashed into him, taking out what was left of Etemenanki's outer wall in this battered chamber as she did so. The force of the blow knocked Raven down, and her body screamed at her when she tried to get up. She did it anyway.

"…Kory…" Raven said. That hadn't been her friend. That had been a mad dog, a creature so out of its mind with rage that she not only hadn't given the slightest care to how she'd landed from a blow, but she also hadn't even considered where her friends had been. Her violent eruption had scattered and battered the Titans (shake and bake, Raven's back mind briefly piped up in a crazy trill) more than the Lord, and once she'd recovered she hadn't given a slightest thought to that fact, instead zeroing in on her enemy and striking with maximum force. Gone, consumed by the very power she'd tried to use to save her friends.

Gone. Marissa was gone. Raven couldn't sense her any more. Her teammates were scattered and broken on the ground. Metatron was dead in the depths. And from the tower, even now, she could feel something terrible. A nauseating power that plunged her into despair: Her home, too, was gone.

Raven fell to her knees. It was over. It was all over. She had no spells left. No tricks, no techniques, no cards up her sleeve. No more misdirections. No more power. She couldn't take the life of one of her friends, no matter what the cost might otherwise be. She had nothing. Nothing…

…save all the power in the world.

Raven's eyes drifted over to the Foreverwhere rift, still open, the white void within emitting a steady, crackling hum.

The power. She could still claim it. The Lord might have stopped her from closing it, but after all her interactions with it, not even he could stop her from drawing from it. She could stop him…

Just like Starfire wanted to…

She had to. She didn't have a choice. She'd let everyone down…she couldn't let them down at the very end of the world…

That's how it would start…

All she wanted…was what was best…

That's what everyone always wanted.

Don't take up the power. All it will cost you is everything.

Take up the power. All it will cost you…is everything.

…Raven turned away.

She bowed her head, her hands pressing into the wrecked stone ground.

She had nothing left.

Nothing…except herself.

"_You're the strongest person I know."_

Was she? What hadn't killed her…

…why hadn't it killed her?

What made her who she was?

Herself…herself.

…and a blade.

The clarity opened in Raven's mind. She looked up. Her hands clenched, and then rose up.

The darkness. The evil. She'd done everything she could. She'd given into the darkness and had it stolen. She'd been offered it again, and turned it away.

To her own soul be true.

The white glow began to suffuse Raven. Sinking into her skin. And around her, Titans trying to recover what little they had felt faint tugging from various parts of their uniforms and bodies.

She would match the gaze of the abyss.

She would dare to bear fangs at god.

* * *

There was no shift or warning before the darkness came. It moved like fluid, with the roar of a tsunami that cut through even the mournful shrieks of the vengeful dead pulsing in this place, crashing into the floor into non-Euclidean shapes, its depths bleeding dark colors man could no more name than see. The shades were repelled by it…they fled the terrible horned and hooved form as it cast its lidless eye over them.

It was Barren.

It was Hungry.

A great, dark head thrust forward and from its bulk lifted a tendril. It had chosen, striking out and seizing one of their numbers from the very air. The Unfortunate was dragged into it…clawing and roiling and shrieking soundlessly for it no longer had a mouth…It had nothing but desperate flails as the without of the beast sunk into it. Twisted, changed, and hollowed out as the shade threw its head back in a howl that would never be heard. The last tendril of Wormwood coiled around where the shade once had eyes…framing them in stiff rectangles.

And Ryce stood in its place.

"A…Ad….am? ADAM!?"

She was moving, the floor flowing beneath her as the dead recoiled from her path. They knew what diseases this predator had dragged in with her. A plague rat no cat would touch. She screamed his name over and over, sounding quite insane. Had this throat flesh she would have rendered it raw with her shouts…she'd have torn it right open with the wounded mewl that fell from her when she finally found his body. A savage bleat ripped out of her sending the spirits around him scattering like so many birds. He draped forward limp as a rag doll against a piece of the ruined floor looking utterly at peace. If not for the devastating and oozing hole in his chest, her friend might simply be asleep.

Ryce fell upon him with the ravenous, fever-bright eyes of the rabid. Clamoring forward on hands and knees, willing this shade she so abused into corporality. Dimly, she could hear the shades howling and shrieking around her. Of course, it had to be the shades. That...that couldn't be _**her**_ voice making that keening begging sob...no…

"Open your eyes," it wasn't a request, wasn't a question or a plea...it was a steel braced command.  
It was not followed.

"Metestasnathean, you open your god damn eyes and **LOOK AT ME**!" she screamed, phantom pain that was not real tearing in her throat.

...nothing...

"...o...oh god, please," the steel was beginning to bend. She had thrown herself into the fire and it was so much hotter than she could have thought possible, "Look at me. Not like this. You don't go out like this." She pawed at his ruined shirt, the warmth echoing into her borrowed non- flesh. Warmth he needed...warmth that meant he was still there bleeding out into the howling world around her. He was still. THERE. He had to be. She wouldn't (_**COULDN'T**_) let him be anything else.

"...n-no...n…o no...nonononononoNO **NO**!" she sobbed, hands fumbling with bitter uselessness against his poor crushed chest, trying to keep the warm in. Shoving it back in like the filling of some broken toy, "No Adam, you dun' do this! You stay! You STAY WITH ME! You dun' get t'break your promise. M'_your fuckin' munchkin and__** you promised****!**_"

The blood was pouring between her fingers in dark hateful ribbons. It began to seep through her hands to patter unto the floor where her legs really weren't folded. All she could do was watch in terror...watch and scream and beg. Moving on pure compulsion she threw herself over him, pressing her lips to his and tried to urge air back into his still lungs. It didn't matter to her that she was nothing more than an echo of death here. She did not care that the dead had no breath to give.

"PLEASE BREATHE...oh gods above, Adam, please! Not b'fore I say it. Not before I TELL you," she babbled madly as the shades joined in with a chorus of their own wailing. She was practically on top of him. Pressing closer, her thighs straddling one of his splayed legs, as she pressed her palms flat to his chest and begged. The position was pathetic and twistedly intimate, hands hooked into his shirt one pressed up to his ruined chest...reaching. Always reaching for something. Her family would have recoiled in revulsion and horror at the Halloween mask smile on her face as she brought it up to his until they were nose to nose, "I...I love you. Please...stay with me. You stay with me...please. Adam...

"I dun' know how to be alone any more..."

She pressed her lips into his, not with breath that wouldn't come. It was a kiss. She kissed him and willed with everything she had left to be able to push past the numb buzz, desperate to truly feel this. Ryce cupped his cheek in her hand and just drove the nothing away, determined to feel his lips even if they were unresponsive against this stolen form. This was hers. Even if it was the last thing that ever would be, this was going to be hers. No one could take this, not the Nothing raging above her head…Not the broken god so far away in a kitchen, eyes shut against the Barren thing bleating the scent of vineyard rot into his face. Not the vile unloving thing that curled up inside her behind an Office Door she had forced herself to just forget. This would be hers.

…Something began to trickle through…

And it was the taste of blood.

Her smile shuddered, then fell, finally shattering like that picture frame from weeks before as she pulled away. Trembling, she laid her cheek to his chest as she had done so many times before. In search of comfort...in contented, quiet moments...in exhausted trust...one last time. One last moment, safe in his arms. She began to whisper, "…le…le' m-me follow. Le'me follow you. _**Please**_…jus' le'me…foll….ow…"

Metatron's flesh was cold.

The dead hung still.

And the bowels of _La Voix De Mort _began to quake with barren, bleating howls.

* * *

The alien was trying to rip his throat out. The Lord was so astonished he almost let her before he finally got a grip, hurling the alien away.

"Hell couldn't hold you then. Fine. You damaged my property. No more games. OBLIVION IT IS." The Lord said.

Starfire blazed directly at the Lord.

Third time was not the charm, as she flew directly into a spray of piercing lasers, the black blasts phasing through the alien and sending rampaging, contradictory signals through her nervous system. The Lord hadn't bothered with such an attack before because a warrior of Starfire's calibre would have immediately worked around it. The mindless beast she had become was left a thrashing, helpless mess, the Lord flying backwards and putting his hands together.

The last time he'd tried this, it had taken a lot longer and had far too much collateral damage. That had been a long, long time ago.

The black void of death bloomed between his hands.

"BLACK-"

The sword pierced out through the Lord's chest.

For two seconds, The Lord could only wonder how Starfire had gotten behind him when she was clearly in front of him.

Then the pain exploded through him, and the Lord's attempted gravity attack snuffed out of existence as he tried to shove the sword out. Some else obliged him, and the Lord turned into a storm of raking, tearing talons. WHITE talons, the attack ending with two hands seizing him, lifting him up, and ripping through his body in an outward butterfly stroke-cut, the Lord recoiling across the sky.

"Kory."

A gentle hand laid itself on Kory's shoulder, the alien keeping herself aloft by instinct alone. As soon as her hand laid itself on the woman, her thrashing stopped. Pain left her body, even as reason returned to her eyes and face.

"…Raven."

"Yes." Raven said. Her shredded outfit was gone, replaced by a fully repaired costume of the purest white, her head long and down past her shoulders. In her hands lay a golden sword, one that only tickled the faintest depths of Starfire's memory. "Titans always fight together. Always."

"…Raven." The Lord said, having reformed. His expression was unreadable, at least until he let out a long, low chuckle yet again. "Of course. That. Always that. The ugliest duckling…becoming a swan."

"What did you say? The successes of your enemies are yours too?" Raven said, holding out the blade.

"And the Fang. The very sword I broke. So you finally found a way to put it back together." The Lord said. "That's a placebo you gave your fellow Titan, you know. The power's still going to rip her apart, be it now or five minutes from now. And what makes you think I won't just break that sword over your head like I did with your lover?"

"Because I learn from history." Raven said. The Lord couldn't help it; he laughed, long and loud and without the slightest hint of anything that laughter should mean.

"This game has gone on long enough. Time for the final moves. _**Shah mat." **_The Lord said, waving his arm. A mass of swords bloomed out of existence in front of him, instrument after instrument of cruel death and horror spreading out like a nightmare flower, before all the petals snapped together and merged into a shifting, crackling THING that didn't seem like it could maintain any permanent shape beyond being sharp and cruel. The Demiurge. "Let us settle this, once and for all! What we started on that rooftop, and long before then! Let us see who shall be born posthumously!"

"The Titans will never die." Raven said. "Let's go."

And so, for the final time, the world shuddered beneath those that would see how it would turn.

* * *

"It is some basic certainty which the noble soul has about itself, something which does not allow itself to be sought out or found or perhaps even to be lost. The noble soul has reverence for itself.

What is noble? What does the word "noble" still mean to us today? What betrays, what allows one to recognize the noble human being, under this heavy, overcast sky of the beginning rule of the plebs that makes everything opaque and leaden?

It is not actions that prove him – actions are always open to many interpretations, always unfathomable – nor is it "works." Among artists and scholars today one finds enough of those who betray by their works how they are impelled by a profound desire for what is noble; but just this need for what is noble is fundamentally different from the needs of the noble soul itself and actually the eloquent and dangerous mark of its lack. It is not the works, it is the faith that is decisive here, that determines the order of rank – to take up again an ancient religious formula in a new and more profound sense: some fundamental certainty that a noble soul has about itself, something that cannot be sought, nor found, nor perhaps lost.

The noble soul has reverence for itself."

- Friedrich Nietzsche, _Beyond Good And Evil_


End file.
